Kage Matsuri
by Rae Seddon
Summary: A secret trial, held to uncover the truth behind Kira, ends with imprisonment of a former student of Whammy House. One year later, a cult worshiping Kira attracts the attention of L’s only surviving successor...or so the world believes.
1. American Consulate

Kage Matsuri

Part 1

American Consulate, Tokyo Japan

"All rise for the honorable judge Robert Stillman to preside over the case of The People vs. Mathew Bensale."

The shuffling of a hundred wood and metal chairs against high-gloss mahogany filled the expansive room up to the rafters, almost drowning the undeniable wave of whispers and under the table pointing when Matt stood. He, aware completely of what the jury and witnesses could only guess.

This was not a kidnapping trial, nor was it a trial about bringing justice to a young, beautiful television personality. This was a trial about Kira, and although no one in the room would admit it, his lawyer was going to make damn sure they knew before it was over.

"Thank you, you may be seated. We will now hear the opening statements: council for the defense you may begin." Matt's lawyer put a firm, reassuring hand on his shoulder, stood and turned to face both the judge and jury.

"Not long ago," he began, looking stern, "the mass murderer known to the world as Kira did more to change society's concept of right and wrong than the Vietnam and Iraq Wars combined—we all remember the fear, the uncertainty—the murder of President Wallace. Socially, it was a war between the supporters of Kira and those that denied him. How many of you were part of that? My client was, acting with full knowledge that he was risking his life and Kira's wrath. It was Kiyomi Takada herself that should have understood how much of a target she was making herself by accepting Kira's message and acting as his avatar to the world. My client's participation in her abduction and death will be understandable to anyone who denied Kira those years he held the _world_ hostage. No matter what is said, remember that the root of it all is Kira, and my client was one of the few brave souls to oppose him publicly and survive, if narrowly."

The prosecution's opening pulled some line about 'taking justice into your own hands' and that doing so would make you no better than Kira. Matt had expected that, and wasn't surprised to see a few members of the jury nod in agreement. They were only denying their gut instincts he knew: the instinct that said if it weren't for people like Mihael Keehl, Nate River and himself, Kira really would have come to rule the world.

"Defense, you may call your first witness."

"Mathew Bensale, will you kindly take the stand?" Matt kept his eyes passive but skeptical up to the stand, took his seat and took oath.

"State your name, age and occupation for the record please."

"Mathew Bensale, age 21, employee of MI5 special operations, trained at Whammy House," he replied calmly.

"What was your relationship with Mihael Keehl and Nate River like, and when did it begin?"

"We grew up together in Whammy House, I was the oldest, Mello…I'm sorry, Mihael was a few years younger than me and Nate was around his ago too."

His lawyer presented the 'evidence' of Matt's records at the House, although thanks to Near, it would be utter hear-say that the three of them attended together. Near and Mello had taken care not to leave much behind. "Eventually, Nate and Mihael were chosen to surpass the House patron's son, L, and I was not. We didn't spend a lot of time together after that." The judge nodded.

"How long, exactly, did you know Mihael Keehl at Whammy House, then?" asked the lawyer.

"Long enough to become rather close… Mihael really didn't fit in very well with the others; we gravitated towards each other about a year after he got there."

"But Mihael left Whammy House a year before the appointed graduation date, can you tell us why?"

Matt sighed and tried to act taxed by the questioning—a good deal of it wasn't that much of an act after all, for how many times he and his lawyer had been over the initial examination.

"It was around that time that Kira killed L, and the head professor, Roger, wanted both Mihael and Nate to work together to catch Kira. Too upset to think rationally and convinced that Nate would be chosen as the true successor anyway, he left."

"How do you know this?"

"I was contacted by Mihael in early 2005. He was living in Los Angeles and asked me to help him catch Kira."

"And you said yes?"

"I did."

"Why, if MI5 had hired you right after graduation?"

"Kira killed L. That was the only reason I needed."

"So you did it because you couldn't stand to see L's killer run free?"

"Yes."

"What was L to you that you would give up that kind of safety and securit? Can you explain what he was to you?"

"God. L was life, he was the reason kids like Mihael and I were able to have the second chances we did. We owed L everything, and I would go so far to say that anyone at Whammy House would say the same." The next set of evidence was written testimony on the part of former Whammy graduates explaining the role L had at The House and its activities. It was in fact L that had made sure MI5 knew about Matt.

"Whammy House has been providing prodigy children like Mathew Bensale and his school colleagues to government and state organizations for years. L's involvement in the Kira case was only to be expected, his murder, however was not." The lawyer said to the jury.

"Matt, tell me about how you and Mihael Keehl kidnapped Kiyomi Takada."

"Mihael was rather far into his investigation of Kira, or…Light Yagami of the NPA. He knew that Light was meeting Takada and most likely passing on his word as Kira to her, from which it would be broadcast world wide. He decided to kidnap Takada because she would help him get to Kira. We were aided unexpectedly by Hal Linder, an ex-CIA agent working for the Special Provision for Kira: the SPK. The plan was to kidnap Takada and force her to tell everything she knew regarding the theory 'Light Yagami is Kira.' Neither survived."

"Aside from your grief at L's death, is there any other reason you aided Mihael Keehl?"

"I believed in what we were doing," Matt said simply, "There were many, hundreds in this position, that would have backed down off the investigation knowing what Kira was capable of. Kira had the Americans and Japanese bent around his finger, and the UN was so petrified they didn't even pretend to offer assistance—the world was in a bad way and it looked like only Mihael and I could do anything about it." His lawyer nodded and addressed the jury again, allowing Matt a moment to get something to drink. It didn't help his disposition that thanks to the four-month long coma he'd _just_ woken up from, he'd essentially quit smoking cold-unconscious-turkey. He'd probably start again once he was in prison, but that wasn't any guarantee.

"—Now, I'd like the jury to be aware that my client was neither present at nor aware of Kiyomi Takada's death until two weeks ago. The injuries he sustained aiding in Mihael Keehl's escape left him in a coma for four months. Matt—

"Yes?"

"Was it part of the plans that after learning what he could about Kira/Light Yagami that Mihael kill Ms. Takada?"

"No, the death of Kiyomi Takada would not have been of any use to Mihael's investigation. The plan as he explained it to me was to kidnap Takada, interrogate her then release her and see how Kira moved after that, knowing that his messenger had been found out."

"As proof of their intent," his lawyer strode over to the evidence table, "Exhibit C, the spent tear gas canister my client used when he assaulted Ms. Takada's entourage. My client was armed alternately with two sawed off shotguns, but only as self defense, is that correct?"

Matt nodded, "Yes sir."

"You said that Mihael was curious to see how Kira moved after Ms. Takada was interrogated. Did he have a theory on that?"

Another nod, "Mihael believed that Kira would kill Ms. Takada the same way he killed the previous host of Sakura TV's Demegawa."

"Do you believe that a situation would have arisen that would have forced Mihael Keehl to murder Kiyomi Takada?" his lawyer asked.

"No sir, I don't believe a scenario like that could have occurred."

"Then how do you explain her death?"

"I believe it was orchestrated by Kira."

"Thank you, Mathew that will be all."

††††


	2. Yamanashi Prefecture

  
Author's Note: All grammar and content editing done by the wonderful SofiaDragon!

* * *

Yamanashi Providence, Wildlife Preserve

Four Months Previous

Asano Sanada had once thought his days of looking after the angry and misguided were over when his son finally moved to Tokyo to start high school. It wasn't as if he didn't miss the boy, but when it came down to it, he barely knew him. A life of traveling from job to job made the 'fathering' bit of his life more difficult than he'd expected. So he was glad when the boy left, taking his love and quiet resentment with him.

Then the foreigner showed up. He'd only just pulled the trundling, complaining pick-up into the drive when the sound of a motorcycle bumping over the gravel caught his aging ears. There was no headlight, but he could see the bike and rider silhouetted by a harvest moon he'd intended to photograph at its pinnacle—that was his job after all. The rider pulled his helmet off with more effort then the action deserved and leaned back in the seat. His neck arched to gaze at the endless expanse of stars and their oblivion backdrop barely visible through thick, laden trees. For a moment, the rider stayed like that, then collapsed onto the gravel drive in what Asano knew had to be deadweight. As a professional photographer he had learned to recognize death and deadweight when he saw it—there was a certain way the body fell, with total obliviousness or disregard to what it might be landing on—and that was it.

Asano hopped out of the truck and ran over to the rider, skidding to a horrified halt when he got his first good look. The exposed skin of the arms and face was burnt raw blond, corn-silk hair drenched in blood from what must have been a head wound. The eyes trembled but stared blankly out and beyond anything Asano could see. He (was it?) was almost a man, but retained the lean form of a young adult. A scar obliterated the flesh beneath his left eye and traveled down his neck past his clavicle. Judging from how the flesh had attempted to heal whatever had given him the mark must have been powerful. Asano took a tentative step forward, when a black-gloved hand shot out and gripped his boot with iron force.

"Hold on, I'll get you inside…" Asano managed, bolting back to the truck for the quilt he kept for assignments that meant he'd be sleeping in the cab. The rider screamed; his throat damaged from whatever had ravaged his body. Getting back, Asano laid the quilt out and rolled the rider onto it, weeping and screaming as more blackened flesh tore away. From what Asano knew of burn injuries, it was a miracle the rider hadn't succumbed to shock yet. The sheer fact that he was able to control the bike to get away from whatever had happened to him was a Herculean feat of endurance.

"It's going to be okay," he told the rider, placing him on his son's old bed. "I'm calling a doctor." The quilt was soaked through with blood and greasy, burnt skin. The room smelled like burnt gas and plastic, an acrid, gagging stench that hadn't been nearly as strong in open air. Asano took out his cell phone and dialed Dr. Ikeda's home number.

_Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring._

_"Moshi Moshi?"_

"Ikeda-sensei, I'm sorry for calling so late, but it's an emergency."

_"Sanada-san? What's the matter?"_

"Someone's very hurt. Burned. He's a foreigner…I don't think he's going to last."

_"Keep him wrapped up and conscious. I'm on my way. The cabin, right?"_

"Yes, please hurry." The line went dead. Asano hurried back into the room, where the rider had kicked the quilt off.

"No, no, no," he scolded, remembering a time his son had gotten ill, "you need to keep warm. I know you don't want to, but it can't be helped." He picked the quilt up and wrapped him in it again. He kicked and moaned but Asano stayed by him the whole time, until headlights reflected in the framed pictures that adorned every wall in the room. Moments later a tall, older gentleman with long silvering hair tied messily back framed the doorway. Dr. Ikeda went almost instantly to work, explaining as best he could what was going to have to happen.

"My name is Dr. Ikeda young man, I'm going to help you, but it's going to hurt…a lot. I can't give you any anesthetics or you'll die, do you understand? You need a skin graft. What's going to happen is I'm going to take skin from your legs and put it onto your arms. I can numb the skin a tiny, tiny bit, but you'll still feel most of it. I'm sorry I can't do more," and he went to work.

Asano did what he could to comfort the rider and keep him still, gagging him so he couldn't bite his tongue and whispering comforts to him. Ikeda had wrapped the head wound, which was small compared to how much blood there was, which allowed Asano to tenderly stroke the boy's head. Eventually they needed to tie his hands down for fear of him ripping the grafts off before they could properly set. The boy's eyes were wild with agony, the sounds coming out through the gag neurotic with fear and anguish. Asano managed to persuade the boy not to struggle just by touching him, reassuring him that through the pain, he was healing, that his body was rejecting the bad and trying to accept the good. He could tell that once the boy must have been quite handsome. There was a rosary wrapped around his wrist that Asano helped him hold, and knowing only one Christian payer said it under his breath, hoping that maybe the boy could read lips. He could apparently, because his grip over the rosary and Asano's hand strengthened, staying taut the whole way through the prayer.

Six hours later Dr. Ikeda pulled off his gloves and sank into a desk chair, running a trembling hand through his now completely unbound hair. The boy would survive as long as he didn't move a muscle for the next 72 hours. They had also gotten a name out of him: Matt. Not long after the gag was removed the boy's lips started to move, repeating the same name over and over again. Curious, Asano went out to examine the bike, which was still as it was six hours before. There was a leather side satchel bare save for a wallet, a pistol, and more foreign money than he cared to count.

The wallet contained no identification aside from a photo of the boy himself only much younger; on the back written in a tiny meticulous hand were the words: "Dear Mello" obviously an unfinished letter of some kind. Asano figured Mello was a nick name of sorts, probably a misnomer at that, if the boy's appearance meant anything. The gun was loaded, but there were no extra bullets.

"What did you find, Sanada-san?" Ikeda asked from the front porch.

"I think your patient has something to do with the yakuza—I found a wallet with no ID, even fake, a gun with a full clip, and a shit load of American money."

"No ID?"

"Just a picture of himself, and what's a kid doing with a gun and this much money?" Asano held up a stack of hundred and fifty dollar bills in either hand.

"What do you want to do?"

"I don't know..." Asano shook his head. Nothing with his own child had ever been this complicated. "He's a kid, criminal or not. He's hurt in a foreign country where no one else probably knows he is; what would you do?"

"I don't have children," replied the doctor.

"He'll stay here with me. Don't tell anyone you were here or mention anything about this to anyone in town. I'll hide the bike and take care of him until he can leave. After that, it isn't my responsibility."

Dr. Ikeda nodded and they went about the business of making excuses for him to visit the hermit photographer until it was certain the rider was recovered. The official story would be that Asano pulled a muscle on the last trip and would need physical therapy for a few months, and with Ikeda being the closest doctor, it's only convenient that he administer to him. He would make excuses to visit even if Asano wasn't there, "checking up on the house," or "need to borrow something" or whatever else was useful. And if they happened to learn the truth behind the rider and how he came to be in that condition, it would stay between the two of them. The money found would not be converted or spent, no matter how tempting. The rider would be safe there, to rest and recover until Ikeda saw it fit for him to leave.


	3. Winchester, England

Winchester, England

_Pa-chick_

…_Pa-chick_

……_Pa-chick_

_Pi! Pi! Pi!_

_Fling!_

_Scatter…_

"L here!"

_"It's Lester. I just heard from Inspector Aizawa; he's made thirteen arrests so far, which should be more than enough to convict Boss Mallory. You did it Near, congratulations!"_

"Oh…thank you. Send Inspector Aizawa my thanks as well. You can come back now."

_"Are you sure Near? There's nothing else you want me to look into while I'm here?"_

"Yes, quite certain Lester. Giovanni and Hal will meet you at the airport."

_"Understood, I'll see you soon."_

"Yes, goodbye."

_Click._

_SLAM!_

_Clatter._

A bone-numbing fog drifted in through the open window, rolling, hanging low over the orchard and tumbling with a morning breeze through the cracked front doors of Whammy House. Possessed by some force not his own, a lithe, white form stepped out onto the cobbled steps, afghan still draped over impossibly thin shoulders. The form shuddered in the cold as it reached up through his feet to make pins and needles in his ankles. The afghan dropped, fluttered like an unfinished letter cast to the wind and crawled down to rest at the bottom, near the old carriage step.

_Step. Step._

A summer snow hare braved sticking its head above the over-grown grass, regarding the white form with a suspicious eye. Was it real? Was it a ghost? What was that big white thing? If the hare could have asked the form itself, the reply it was likely to get was: "Nothing."

Because about how he felt. And there was only one person that could change that.

And he was dead. So the logic pattern the boy used went like this: "I feel X. X crappy. X + counter X nullifies X. Therefore, absence of counter X ensures a continuance of X. X cannot be nullified. X crappy absolute."

A short black car pulled up, out of which stepped a man of exceptional bearing, broad faced and smiling. He wore a pair of navy suspenders, tan slacks and a gun holstered under his right shoulder. At sight of the white-clad boy and discarded afghan he let out a low sigh.

"Can't you wait inside for once Near, it's freezing."

The boy didn't reply but turned and went back inside, the same sad, distant gaze never leaving his soft still-young features. The hare had vanished before anyone in the car could see it. The driver, a pretty blond woman took the afghan from Lester and folded it over her arm, muttering.

"You know I don't think he ever considered it happening…everything with the House coming to him and all. I think he still thinks it belongs to…

"I know Hal. Believe me I know."

Lester had worked with Quillish Whammy since before he could remember, everything else in his life seemed unimportant to what the House had given him, what it had shown him about the nature of kindness, perseverance and second-chances. Hal herself was one such second chance. But with the proprietor, primary and secondary inheritors dead, everything had gone to Near, Nate River, the last of the great four.

But Near hadn't wanted it. It was the only time Lester could ever remember hearing Near yell.

_"We, Quillish Whammy and son hereby entrust the future of Whammy House to one of the following students: Roger Samson, Nate River, Mihael Keehl or Mathew Bensale. Should none of the students other than Roger Samson be of age when this will is put into effect, ownership of Whammy House will be cooperative between the four, or however many wish to be part. All are allowed to disregard this will except Nate River, whom we have the utmost confidence and trust in. _

_Quillish Whammy and Son"_

The argument had been explosive. Near had broken at least fourteen model-kits and sent flying thousands of puzzle pieces that only he could sort out. But since that argument, the boy had changed, and the playroom where the argument happened hadn't. It was a monument to his anger, the one time he lost control. And Near visited it every day, studying it like he would a crime scene; analyzing and calculating the trajectory of the plastic and paper bits looking for a point of origin.

Lester and Hal followed Near to the playroom where he lay amid the chaos on his stomach, his feet kicking lazily up in the air and peering at his care-takers like some kind of deranged baby owl, his neck twisted impossibly to one side. With one hand he inched a toy car along with his fingers and with the other ran it over a pile of puzzle pieces, scattering them again.

"Inspector Aizawa will be sending you the report as soon as it's written up; I assume you'll want to review it?" Lester asked. Near nodded. "I was also approached by agents Matsuda and Ide, they're working on a case now and would like you to look a few things over. They gave me the number to contact them with, will you be—

"Yes, contact them immediately."

"Near, it's two in the morning in Japan right now, I'll have to—

"Immediately, please, thank you Lester."

Hal threw the afghan on the floor.

"For god's sake Near stop acting like a child! We all know you never wanted this. The least you can do is not inconvenience good, hard working people!" She stopped. "Oh my god, I'm so sorry… Near I didn't mean…

"It's alright, Linder, you are correct. I am being childish. I am just going through some difficult feelings at the moment and need time to process them, until then, please go about business as usual. Lester, you may contact Agents Matsuda and Ide when it is the most convenient for them."

Lester nodded, "Understood, tomorrow morning then."

"As you see fit, I trust your judgment."

With that, Lester strode off to his office down the hall, leaving only Linder, her eyes betraying the disquietude of being alone with Near after her outburst.

"I really am sorry, Near. Of course you're having trouble…I shouldn't be angry at you for grieving. But, can I ask one thing?"

"Of course."

"Who are you grieving for, L, Mello, or yourself?"

"All of us, I suppose. It's sad that N is left alone, but it is also sad for L and for M to have died."

Hal nodded, fighting back tears she thought she'd shed long ago. She sniffed, a little too loudly because Near noticed and stopped kicking his feet.

"I'm sorry, Near…I have to—

Suddenly something short and stooped and clad in white was burying his head into her chest. She felt and heard him give out a shuddering wail of sorrow, the toys and puzzles forgotten. His arms wrapped around her and she slumped to the floor, cradling him and clinging to him as if he was the only thing left in the world that mattered.

"Shhh…shh…Oh, honey no…" she stroked the top of his head, "Shh…shh…" All Hal could do was hold him, hold him and rock back and forth on her heels; a breeze drafted by and, echoing back, the sound of two heavy wooden storm doors clicking shut against the rising wind.


	4. Orange County Penitentary

Part 2

One Year Later

Orange County Penitentiary, California,

Solitary Confinement, Block D-1-6-2

_"We're sorry, the number you have dialed cannot be reached, please hang up and try again."_

"Bensale, let's go, time's up!" Matt looked up from his thoughts and seriously weighed if it would be worth flipping the toadie off. He decided against it and hung up the phone. The guard smirked and prodded him along back down the hallway.

"Rumor has it you dial the same number every time, who you trying to reach like that, the dead?"

"Something like that." The guard let out a disgusting snort-chuckle-gag noise that made Matt want to hit him for living. Nothing alive should make that kind of noise. It was an insult to life. Everyone there was an insult to the concept of living, even him.

And yet something kept him dialing that number every month. Even insults to life were apparently granted their hope, should they seek it.

_Ring. Ring. Ring._

"Holy shit!" Matt didn't care if the guard had a tonfa pointed at the back of his skull. Matt didn't care that the guard had a gun. He was answering that phone. He made it into the booth and jammed it closed with his body before picking up the receiver.

"Mello?!"

_"This is Near."_

"What are you doing with Mello's phone?"

_"I found it."_

"When?!"

_"Just now. Where are you?"_

"I'm in jail, you jackass! For the kidnapping and murder of Kiyomi Takada."

_"Would you like me to send someone to pick you up? Linder, maybe?"_

_THUMP! _

_"What was that?"_

"Nothing Near, what do you mean, pick me up?"

_"As in remove you from prison, which prison?"_

"Orange County Pen."

_"Alright, I'll send Hal and Lester there immediately. Would you like them to bring anything?"_

"Chocolate. As much as they can carry."

_"Very well. You'll be hearing from them soon."_

"Seriously…this isn't a joke?"

_"Not in the least. Good bye Matt."_

"Bye."

Matt stepped out of the booth and proceeded to get the shit kicked out of him. He didn't care. It was the last beating he'd ever take, from anyone. He wanted to remember it. Eventually, the Warden happened by and stopped the guard before any serious damage was done. He'd just gotten a call from MI5. They wanted their boy back.

Matt grinned through a mouthful of blood; the Warden escorted him to the bathroom where he promptly vomited a good deal of what he'd eaten that morning. While he vomited the Warden explained that no less than ten minutes ago he'd gotten a call from Lieutenant Inspector Lester of MI5 saying that under the condition that he aid MI5 in a life-threatening operation, Matt could be released a good fifteen years early. The Warden, who had followed Matt's trial the previous year and had always opposed Kira, believed that Matt had acted as any feeling human being would have in that situation. Shawshank Prison this _wasn't._ According to the Warden, the MI5 agents in charge of the case would interview him tomorrow if it was convenient. Matt agreed after the fifth gargle of lukewarm water. For once, something Mello did wasn't turning out a complete disaster.

By eleven thirty the following morning Matt was escorted into a small white washed office, hand-cuffed and watched over by the Warden from the corner of the room. Matt hadn't seen Lester in close to six years, but the man had barely aged. His hair was lighter, but that was all.

"How are you holding up?" he asked.

"I'm fine," Matt replied, grinning through one and a half black eyes.

"Look, Matt, let me cut to the chase. L believes that Kira…or rather, a Kira-like entity has begun killing again. In absence of Mello he wants you to help him investigate." Matt was the closest to face-faulting he'd been since waking up in a Japanese hospital one year and four months ago to be told he was being accused of murder.

"You're fucking shitting me."

"I'm afraid not. Now, if L's theory is correct you are in considerably more danger now than you were before. The chance that this faux Kira knows your name and face is very high. Knowing this, are you still willing to aid L in his investigation?"

Matt wanted to break something. Preferably Near, when he saw him. Of course it wasn't going to be this easy, it never was. Because Matt Bensale was a cursed man, always had been. Cursed like Mello with a brain and a survival instinct a mile wide. The survival instinct roused just then, screaming for him to stay in jail, where it was safe.

"But if I stay here, I could die just like all the other victims…never having a chance to fight back. Fuck that. I'm in." And for the first time in a year and four months, Matt smiled honestly. He was a free man. Dead, but free.


	5. Shioriwacho, Yamanashi

Shiroiwa-cho, Yamanashi Prefecture

A chill, early autumn breeze blustered through unpaved side alleys and set wooden signs, loosely tacked flyers, and various other street detritus swaying, fluttering; tumbling as a dusty motorcycle pulled up in front of the town clinic. The rider removed his helmet gingerly, careful not to jar his neck, put the bike on idle and walked inside, tossing the helmet down on a seat next to him. There was no secretary, as always.

"Ikeda-saaaannn!" he called out in his brutal, vulgar Japanese.

The old doctor stepped out of his office at the call; put both hands on his hips and shook his head.

"Come in, Mello, let's just get this over with."

"Gladly."

The skin grafts had taken beautifully, and the doctor had slowly been working on the scarred flesh beneath Mello's left eye, but today was the boy's last visit. He shrugged out of his clothing and hopped onto the examination table, popping a Hershey's Kiss into his mouth.

"Look straight ahead…good…touch your nose…alright…reflexes…"

It surprised Doctor Ikeda that Mello had bothered to show up at all, as both he and Sanada-san were convinced he'd run away the moment he had use of his legs. But like clock-work, Mello showed up on his bike every other week. The excuse Sanada-san told in town was that Mello was a foreign exchange student who was taking an internship in photography. It helped, apparently, that Mello was something of an artist and musician.

Checking Mello's range of motion, Dr. Ikeda remembered the evening he was driving up to see Sanada-san and heard the most beautiful sound coming from the cabin: piano music. No one had played the piano in that cabin since Akiko passed away more than twenty years ago…but there was Mello, his gloved fingers flying across the keys. Sanada-san looked ready to cry; Mello pretended not to notice and kept playing. Afterward, when Sanada-san had asked where Mello learned to play he said 'at school.' In fact, that was his default answer for everything.

"Where did you live?"

"At school."

"When did you learn to paint?"

"While in school."

"Do you have any family?"

"I did. At school."

Eventually they'd stopped asking questions and just let Mello _be._ For what this young man was, was the most beautiful paradox either of the men had ever known. He dressed only in black, and for some reason avoided the color white at any cost. Blank canvas would only stay blank for a little less than a day before the most bizarre landscapes would emerge—abstractions pulled from the depths of hell itself. Always there was fire, always there was color, black, the denial of white.

It had taken forever for Sanada-san to get a picture of him, too. For the longest time the young man would throw a fit and storm off in a huff down to the store so to binge on whatever candy chocolate was available at the time. Until one day, Mello finally gave in and allowed a single photograph, of which he kept the negatives of on him at all times. Sanada-san had promised never to give the photo away should anyone inquire as to his whereabouts. Undeniably, it was the best portrait Sanada-san had ever done. Mello had posed, bare-chested, the face and shoulder scars completely exposed, with an expression of such ineffable sadness and distraction—it was the type of photo that won awards.

"Sensitivity test…" Dr. Ikeda took out a needle and began to poke a few of the scared areas.

"Ow…nothing…ow…nothing, nothing, nothing _MOTHER FUCKER!"_

Dr. Ikeda grinned despite the death glare aimed directly at him. There was nothing more as a healer of bodies he could do: Mello was a healthy as he was likely to be after whatever he'd gone through.

"That's that, you can get dressed and be on your way."

"_Finally._" Mello grumbled, pulling on his clothes. "Hey doc…could you spare a little money for gas? I got a long way to go."

"You aren't saying good bye to Asano-kun?" Ikeda had become rather familiar with Sanada-san over the year. It was something that would have never happened if not for this strange, foreign boy.

"He's been expecting me gone for months. Figure I shouldn't keep him waiting any longer."

The doctor rummaged in his desk safe for the money he'd been putting aside for close to a year. He handed the wad over to Mello, closing his gloved fingers over it gently.

"I can't take this…it's too much."

"You can't spend the money you have with you, obviously, and you're going to need a new cell phone after that tantrum last week."

Mello shrugged, pocketed the money, calling out a disgruntled "Ja ne!" as he scoped his helmet from the padded vinyl chairs. Dr. Ikeda watched him go with an oddly resolved feeling. Whether saving the boy's life was the right thing to do or not, he'd never regret it.

Outside, Mello went over the mental checklist he'd had a good year to refine:

Stop 1: Tokyo. Goal: Fake ID, under the name Alexandre Denuve.

Stop 2: Nearest cell phone salesman. Goal: new phone.

Stop 3: Airport. Goal: one, one-way ticket to Paris, preferably first class; and chocolate, probably between stops 1 and 2.

According to Doctor Ikeda and Asano, there had been no official word as to whether Kira was captured or not, but at least as far as the popular media was concerned, criminals had stopped dying. That probably meant one of a few things: Near had captured Light Yagami and/or Misa Amane, Light had beaten Near but was laying low, considering how close he'd come to being discovered, or neither had won, the race was still on, but a media blackout had been ordered. For paranoia's sake he was more willing to believe option three than either of the first two. Matt was dead, or so he gathered; if he wasn't he'd have followed him to the church, and if not that, contacted him _somehow_ in the past year and a half. Accepting that reality had hurt at first, had hurt more than the new skin bonding to his body, but like all pain it had faded over time.

Country-side flew by as Mello wound his way around rice fields and farms, stopping to buy gas and a few pears from a stand right next to a sign that read 'Nagano, 7 miles.' He grimaced, realizing that if his bearings were right, he'd be passing the church that would have been his crematorium.

"Is there a church around here?" he asked the dumpy woman manning the produce stand.

"There was not but last year…some godless soul started a fire and burnt it to the ground."

"Is that so?"

"Sure as I stand."

Mello nodded his thanks and took off, deciding to pay his would-be resting place a visit.

His memories of that day were clear. He'd seen that Takada was about to pull a piece of paper from her bra and tried to knock her the _hell_ out, but she'd gotten to it first…beaned him _good_ with a discarded metal candle holder. If he hadn't woken up when his coat caught fire, he'd have burned with her. But the damage had been done, no matter how he looked at it. Mello found the ruined church and parked the bike behind one of the few walls still standing high enough to hide it from the road.

Blackened pews, a rotting, flower-sprouted altar, the smell of dew and earth assaulted his tender nostrils. Animals scurried at his presence, unused to such a brazen intrusion to their sanctuary. Mello ran a hand through his corn silk hair to tame it from being stuffed under the helmet for so long when something at the foot of the altar caught a dark eye.

It was a toy. Obscured and hidden by the tall grass and flowers, there lay a rusting model train with new baby grass poking up from the tracks underneath. Mello knelt, took the train in one hand and turned it over and around, examining every inch. He shuffled forward on the balls of his feet and kicked yet another hidden object in the grass.

_Tumble. Shatter!_

A framed, empty portrait draped in black cloth cracked on the stone floor under foot. Disbelieving, Mello picked it up with a trembling hand, his dark eyes suddenly moist; the back of his throat pained with holding back.

"Near…" a gloved hand shifted the broken glass in the frame over its white backdrop, tears silently washing collected dust and dirt out and away.


	6. Winchester Revisited

Winchester, England

Revisited

_Clatta- Clatta- click- click_

_Creeeaaaakkk…_

"Near, we're back."

A pair of icy eyes looked up from the flickering computer screen in front of him. Lester escorted a young man with spiky fire red hair and intense, suspicious, dark eyes. Matt was a good foot taller than Near so for the sake of comfort, Near gave up the tall chair he'd perched himself in so the young man could sit. It had been close to six years since the two had seen each other face-to-face, but it was hard to tell who was the more surprised: Near for the fact that Matt was almost exactly as he remembered him, or Matt for Near being so utterly different.

"How was the flight?" Near asked.

"Fine, fine…now cut the crap and tell me what you need me to do."

"You are going to Japan." Near said simply, continuing before Matt could object, "you are going to get a job; from there you are going to lead what most Japanese would consider a normal life. But for me, you will be monitoring an up-and-coming cult called the KS, Kira Society, whom I believe to be orchestrating an elaborate set of mass murders all by use of immolation."

"Fire?"

"Apparently, Kiyomi Takada's death is the last death that can accurately be traced to Kira, and his followers have taken that as a sort of…inspiration."

"What about Mello?"

"Nothing was proven one way or another. It's a little difficult to determine cause of death when there isn't a body."

Matt's jaw dropped. "Wait a minute, no body?"

"You didn't know?"

"I was told he died in the fire!"

"Probably to better procure a confession; but I assure you, Mihael Keehl's body was never found. Neither was his motorcycle."

"So…he could still be alive…"

"The possibility isn't zero. I'd say, current evidence accounted for," Near held up a familiar looking cell phone, "it's about 4."

Matt sighed, remembering Near's perchance for percentages. Saying something was possible was never enough, exactly _how_ possibly had to be taken into account as well, no matter how hopeless it made the endeavor seem.

"So, in other words, you're pulling all of this out of your ass…the cult too I'm guessing?"

Near made a distasteful expression at Matt's vulgarity.

"On the contrary…the possibility of a cult is upwards to 57. I am merely saying with only as much evidence as we have towards Mello's condition, it is unwise to let my personal desires influence the numbers."

Matt arched an eyebrow. The impression Matt had gotten of Near from Mello was that he had no feelings at all to factor into _anything_. That had apparently changed. Near typed a few things out on the computer and turned the monitor towards him.

"This is a map of the most recent deaths in Japan only classified as 'accidental burning.' The deaths spiked four months after Light Yagami's death…I can only assume it was because of your trial, which was held in Japan, was it not?"

Matt nodded.

"All of the victims were criminals on some level, petty larcenists, GTAs, murders and rapists on bail, and a horde of yakuza members. On top of that—

_cl-click_

"In-prison violence has tripled from last year, with the number of violent beatings leading to death being 70 more than in the past five years."

Matt gave an appreciative nod. "Guess I'm lucky you got me out when you did."

"Exceedingly," concurred Near, "I was surprised by your call, to be honest. I had assumed the worst when the statistics came back."

"About that," Matt shifted in the chair, moving to pick up Mello's phone. "Where did you find this?"

"A park ranger in Yamanashi found it on a routine hike. People drop them all the time, but the fact that it was Mello's…

"Yamanashi is a long way from Nagano. What's the probability he escaped the fire and made it all the way out there before ditching it? Maybe he was afraid of being followed?"

Near inclined his head slightly, a look that spoke of cautious contemplation.

"He may have been justified… But realistically the possibility isn't very high…lower than 4. Mello is exceptional, but not inhuman."

Matt was getting really, really fed up with the bloody percentages. He was seriously considering calling Near on it when the headset the boy was wearing beeped.

"L here."

"It's Watari," an aged voice—Roger—spoke out over the static. "I've just gotten word than a person by the name of Alexandre Denuve is meeting with a prominent French politician on a matter of importance. Should I follow up?"

The name meant nothing to Matt but Near's eyes widened to the point of taking up a large portion of his pale, young face.

"Yes, but do so discreetly. If we're in the wrong, I don't want to make life any more difficult for Mr. Denuve."

"Understood."

Near turned the microphone away from his mouth and grinned in that childishly creepy way that meant something may have just gone very much in his favor. It was a look Matt remembered vaguely as the single most disturbing thing about his stay at Whammy House.

"Denuve was one of the former L's pseudonyms…only four people in the world know or knew that: Light Yagami, Quillish Whammy, myself and Mihael Keehl."

The red head's heart skipped a beat. He was half way out of the room before he even registered Near calling after him.

"If Mello is smart, Matt, he'll come to us. Blowing his cover now will endanger you both. Just because a majority of the deaths by the KS is concentrated in Japan doesn't mean there aren't factions elsewhere…Think about how much danger Mello would be in if you went there now!"

An acknowledging sigh whispered past Matt's lips, as if he were blowing smoke out. He'd never started again, but the last twelve hours already felt like motivation enough. That or a drink. Beer; something to wash the sick taste of yielding to the reasoning of a quasi-albino 19-year-old child.

Maybe it was the year in prison where the other inmates were too scared to touch him, knowing he'd had something to do with Kira…or the twelve months of dialing the phone number of a dead man, to have it answered by the last person on the planet he'd thought about talking to, or the flight, or his nine hours as a free man, assaulted by the paranoia that any minute he could just drop dead. Was this what Mello had lived with after loosing the notebook? Was this why he had Matt cooped up in an apartment spying on the NPA, barely showing his face to anyone but him?

"So, when do you want me in Japan?" he asked.

"I suppose you'll need to acclimate yourself to free life again…I'll book a flight two weeks from now."

"Where do I sleep?"

"Wherever you wish…some of the rooms are taken but attendance…dropped…

considerably after the previous L's death. Mello wasn't the only one to leave."

Matt acknowledged silently and wandered off to find the room he once shared with Mello, somewhere on the third floor—a set of polished bunk beds shoved into a perpetually dusty corner with a single window seat large enough to accommodate one sitting, knees tucked in, the other sprawled, resting their head against the other's legs. The window itself always open, a soft, fragrant spring breeze wafting through, tickling hair against bare skin…undertones of chocolate and pencil lead. Before the guns, before 'Inspector' Lester, before Mello's rabid competition with Near, before L's death…there had been a comfort in it all, a comfort that had emanated and flowed from a certain black haired young man like an aura.

Matt found the room discarded and unclean, layers of dust, inches of cobweb and the mustiness expected for a place that had essentially been air-tight for close to a decade. Chewed, snapped and blunted pencils with no erasers littered the floor, brittle as twigs when stepped on. Shaking his head, he strode the length of the room and forced the window open, leaning on both knees to reach the latch and force it undone.

_Cricka-Crika-Squeeeeaaakkk!_

The breeze felt odd against his scalp and not for the first time, Matt contemplated how much he missed his old hair, the hair that as boys Mr. Whammy would scold him to get cut, and the hair that Mello would fiddle with in the height of summer, spiking it up or just run his fingers through when he was bored. Then L had to go and tell Lester about Matt's natural aptitude with guns, and all of a sudden Near was all Mello thought about.

Near had watched Matt disappear and untensed his body from the near-running position it had gone into as soon as Roger contacted him. The percentage that Mello was alive had just jumped from 4 to about 45. For the first time in a year and a half he allowed himself hope. With Matt willing to be his eyes and ears in Japan, and Mello potentially in France, there was an 80 chance of his fledging plan pulling itself together as a success. Slowly, Near lowered himself into the chair again and went back to the game of computer shoji he'd been playing before Matt arrived. The boy was almost exactly as he remembered: impulsive, passionate, vulgar, impolite…Mello in a different skin. Fumbling for the remote, Near clicked on the three walls of television monitors that displayed a different area of the House, scanning them until he settled on Matt, who had holed up and fallen asleep on the third floor. He had been ambivalent about bringing him back to the House, knowing his history with it—the rumors, his less than complimentary relationship with Lester, but when it boiled down to it, the boy was useless to him dead in prison. And he tired of being alone, being the only one hoping in vain for the impossible, waiting for a phone that never rang, that would probably never ring.

It was true that if Mello was smart, he'd contact the House as soon as possible; but more likely than not his pride would stop him at the last minute. But surely, using L's other name was a form of contact in and of itself? Near sunk into the chair completely and rested his head in his hands. Even suppressed hope was hope, and to have such a surge of it was exhausting—impassivity was only a front he could keep up for so long. It was a savior when working on a case where he needed a certain amount of detachment—like a few months ago with that serial murderer and rapist in Spain, where he'd acted as bait himself, luring the guy out until Lester, Hal and Giovanni could make an arrest…but this was something else. This was Mello, the only person who had dared to challenge him; the only one with the fool's errand of trying to be his better…as if loosing L had been hard enough.

Matt awoke, feeling just as covered in dust and age as the rest of the derilict little nook he shared with Mello all those years ago. The onset of an early summer dusk bathed him drowsy warmth, giving an earthy, blurred feel to the world around him. The breeze had died off, making way for the unmistakable smells of coming night, moist; humid.

Someone stepped on a discarded pencil behind him, making it roll softly deeper into the deceiving half-light of the room. Roger's stooping, arthritic body framed the doorway, taking up far less space than Matt remembered. Matt looked up, insinctual feelings of resentment and suspicion on his still partially awake mind. His eyes narrowed.

"Something told me I should have asked Jane to air this place out a little."

"Nah," Matt dismissed, not missing a beat, "that would have only made me feel welcome. Why break tradition?" A dissapointed sigh breathed into the room from Roger's direction, so soft it barely disturbed the whorls of dust hanging in the air.

"I deserved that, I admit. Matt...before you get any more involved with Near, there are a few things you should know about his...condition, as L. Will you meet me in the garden?"

Curious, Matt nodded, but waited for Roger to leave before unfolding himself from the window seat, running a hand over his eyes and sleepily scratching his neck. The garden was beyond the kitchen, to the east of Whammy's rear courtyard—vaguely a memory surfaced of one of his fellow students playing Spanish gituar there; a strain of it, poassionate, plaintive, rooted in his mind.

Sneaking out through the kitchen made him feel eleven years old again, only no one stopped or scolded him when he dipped his finger in an unset jello mould. Roger stood on the second step next to the cellar, his eyes fixed on the distant, prismatic clouds.

"So what's eating Gilbert Grape?" Matt asked, enjoying the look of distate at his comment.

"Near, as you remember was...difficult when he first came here." Roger started cautiously.

"Sorta, I remember he would throw a tantrum if you so much as bumped into him, so what?"

"Fear of physical contact isn't the worst of it with autisim believe me. But because of L's...unique talent, he was able to bring Near farther out of his shell then seven years in any government facillity. He was the perfect therapist for Near, and Near thrived, under him." Roger paused, shifted, lowering himself onto the step in a bloodless surrender, "L never finished working with Near, Matt...according to his personal assesment it would take years before anything he taught him stuck. And now Near is forgetting."

"Forgetting what?"

"How to feel. L taught Near how to interpret emotions that would have been mysteries to him." The old man shook his head. "It was the reason I asked Mello to work with Near to begin with—Mello would have made up for in natural instinct what Near never could have had...together..."

"They did beat Kira, though." Matt reminded.

"And this time?" Roger forced himself up, using Matt as temporary leverage. As a big a stone had just settled in Matt's stomach, the old man had a point. For the most part, Near lacked, as most autistics tend to, what normal functioning people called instincts. Fight-or-flight could be taught, yes, but nothing beat (usually) those gut reactions. Near had none to speak of, and going against Kira again, in that blunted condition, was the same as any death wish. What Roger wanted but was to proud to pose as a question, was for Matt to help Near re-learn what fledging instincts L had instilled in him, and make up for in the operation whatever else Near lacked. But Matt wasn't so sure.

"What make you think I could do anything L couldn't finish?" he asked, honestly wondering and partly knowing what the anwser would be.

"You knew Mello. You tamed that beast and I have every faith you'll bring out Near's."

Roger patted Matt's shoulder distractedly, walking back in through the kitchen and leaving Matt to face the decision alone. He had never taken long to make up his mind about anything; it had taken him a total of three minutes to say yes when Mello asked him to help kiddnap Kiyomi Takada. It took him four minutes to decide to find Near, who was either going to hate him now or hate him a lost less later for what he was about to do.

He made his way to the playroom, glad to see he still knew Near well enough to know where to find him in the sprawling, Gregorian moster that was Whammy's.

A pale, peachy light shining through the curtians muted the room, casting tepid shadows in fragments over everything. Near was hunched by a blanket strewn on the floor, his tiny, pale fingers sweeping through a million nameless plastic bits and seperating them into piles. Matt hesitated at the door, already starting to second guess himself, remembering a Near that would have violently thrown him out if disturbed during such an activity...but that was a long, long time ago. Swallowing his doubt, he shook his head in mild astonishment that he was actually obeying Roger for once and stepped into the playroom.

If Near noticed at all, the absolute lack of body language was deceiving enough. Matt almost felt like clearing his throat, but one step further in and Near looked up, eyes as pale as new winter ice catching his for less than a second before looking away.

"Have you given any more thought to this Denuve guy being Mello?" Matt asked.

Near replied without looking at him.

"I have given it all the logical thought I can without diving into blind speculation."

A hand shot out over the piles, Near seeing things with his autistic eyes that Matt could only vaguely perceive, a uniformity of some kind.

"What are you going to do if that's the case?" Matt asked, no longer supressing the frustration at Near's deadpan voice and distracted, avoidant eyes. It had been a while since he'd had to _try _to get a reaction out of someone.

"That is a situational question, right now there are too many unknowns to factor in. I told you rushing to Mello's side...if it is Mello...right now could very well kill him."

Matt allowed a twinge of anger to spark through his body, remembering in startling detail events it had taken months after his coma to remember—Mello's complete and absolute desperation in kidnapping Takada, their last chance to do _something_ to fight Kira's influence in the world. Little did they know, they were already in their death throws.

"And how do you think Mello feels, totally cut off? What if he needs us _now_ and not _later?"_

_"_The pertentages of that being the case are less than 2 percent at this point." It amazed Matt that Near's voice hadn't so much as changed tempo. "I fail to see how he feels will influence anything."

Matt snapped. From the moment he set foot back in the House, he'd had enough of Near's fucking percentages, and that was going to stop. Now. Not caring how the boy would react, Matt took the distance to Near in four long strides, grabbed Near by the hand and pulled him up in one sudden jerk.

"This matters, Near," he practically hissed, holding out Near's hand despite the boy's efforts to pull away. Matt twined his fingers with Near's, locking their hands together as one. He could tell the sudden, almost violent contact was scaring the other boy, but he was already compensating. Matt hitched his voice lower, calmer. "People have interlocking pieces too...feelings are what tell us if those pieces fit right...Is this, alright?"

For the first time in the confrontation, Near looked at Matt for more than a few seconds and whimpered. His eyes were mirrors of turmult, as if their ice were trying to melt from the bottom up.

"I don't understand...how..." Near said, still trying to pull limpy away, his resolve lost in a mixture of fear and confusion.

"Look closer."

Matt turned their hands so Near could see the palms, oddly disproprotionate but still fitting together, feeling each other's warmth. "This is the only way I know how to explain it." Matt admitted, "But I have to try...for Mello, if not for you. If you have to play knight in shining armor he has to be able to reach out to you. You can't pull away, Near. If you want to help him..."

Near cut Matt off by taking his other hand in his own and slowly, shivering from anxiety, locking their fingers togerher like the first. There was a reverence in the action, a blind, wonderous fasination that Matt hoped to god meant something was getting through, synpases were firing somewhere important. For a moment there was a silence as Near simply stared, as if memorizing every scar and mark and scab on Matt's rough hands, and how bizarely unflawed his own hands appeared in contrast: cut and uncut, polished and chipped marble and ivory. Finally, Near did something Matt wouldn't have seen coming a mile away.

Near looked directly into Matt's eyes. And Matt knew he understood, if not perfectly, a little better than he had before. He was still shaking and afraid, but something he'd said or done had struck a chord.

"L never touched me." Near stated, numbly. "But I didn't care, I didn't see anything wrong about it. I thought he was just respecting how comfortable he made me by just...being."

Matt nodded, having guess that was the case some time ago. L had done many things for Near, but not addressing the fear of contact was either something they hadn't gotten to, or wouldn't. And Mello, for better or worse, was all about contact. Matt himself was that happy medium, so obviously, Roger had peged him as the perfect bridge between the two extremes.

Oddly enough, the feeling of being Roger's heel, again, was out weighed by the look Near was _still_ giving him—the look that said the fog was lifting over a mystery. They stayed like that, linked at the hands until Near pulled away on his own; resuming his huched sit. To Matt he appeared more than a little releived, but tired, more than willing to be distracted for the next few hours. His attention focused back on the project at his feet in a matter of seconds, but Matt knew he wasn't about to forget what had just happened.

"I'm going to fence something from the kitchen, you hungry?" Matt asked, moving to the door.

"Just bring me a chocolate bar," Near said. Matt smiled wryly, shaking his head. Oh, how we put our fingers in each other's clay...


	7. Paris, France

Part 3

Paris, France

He'd forgotten how much the Seine stunk in the summer, and the masses that gathered at water's edge in the vain hope of seeking relief from a still distant sun. He'd walked to the rendezvous point, a dock-side cocktail bar for the rich whole liked to pretend they were poor—plastic, rustic décor, gaudy, bright, everything a real 'dive' wouldn't be: especially clean. There was a band playing loud American rock, the singer's accents murdering what they wouldn't recognize as classic lines anyway. Mello shifted in his stool and ordered another drink, telling himself he wasn't as conspicuous as he felt, dressed in a deep crimson button up shirt and black slacks, his longer-than-normal hair tied back with a thin satin ribbon stolen from a store mannequin along with the pants and shirt. The money Dr. Ikeda gave him barely lasted him an hour from the airport, finding the cheapest hostel in the city and bartering his riding goggles for breakfast. It had been a long time since he'd been so close to total traveler's poverty: the last time had been right after he left Whammy House when he was fourteen.

"Cognac please," a distinguished voice said beside him suddenly. Mello turned slowly around, just to make sure the man behind him was who he thought.

"Good evening minister," Mello said, finishing the vodka left in the glass, "you'll forgive him that Mr. Denuve could not appear in person. I am Jean, his errand boy."

The minister was a sweating, nervous man with eyes too small for his head and fingers to fat for the rest of his hands. Nonetheless, he bought what Mello told him.

"Of-of course and an intimidating sight you are, young man…now what is this favor?"

"Denuve needs to find L."

"The detective? What on earth would he need him for?"

"They have unfinished business, which is not for you to know. Now, will you help, or should my master let France 2 know you hired those four prostitutes to ruin your opponent's campaign last election?"

The minister startled so badly at the threat his glass jumped in his hand.

"No, no! I'll help him find L…don't worry. If Eraldo Coil was able to get close enough to almost discover him, then I'm sure my men can."

Mello tapped the bar to signal another refill, got it and raised his glass. "I would indeed hope so, minister. To…tying up loose ends."

_Clink._

Mello threw down what Euros he had left for drinks, including the minister's and made his way out, looking for the nearest night club. He and Matt had snuck into so many in London, New York and L.A money wasn't an issue. A good four blocks down, he stumbled across one blaring Euro Pop and Industrial, found the window into the men's bathroom and shimmied through, righting his clothes in the bathroom mirror before beginning his hunt for the most violent mosh pit there.

There was no rhythm, there was no order to the way he was spun and shoved about by the crowd, all the voices gathered together to form a noise so devoid of anything like tempo, back-beat, it helped Mello forget that at any second he might drop dead from a heart attack or burst into flames like he almost had back in Japan. It was therapeutic to forget in the midst of essentially beating the shit out of total strangers who probably spoke as much of the native tongue as he did.

Then, out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of something that made his already distracted brain go, "Hey, wait a minute…" There was a blast, the floor shook, people screamed and he would have been trampled if he hadn't pulled himself up onto one of the platforms at the last minute. What he had seen before the blast was figures in long, black cloaks hurl something towards the center of the room, towards him. He guessed from the ensuing events the something had been a small, albeit extremely combustible bomb—because someone was burning, still alive, screaming and gagging for air—and all Mello could do was watch. It was impossible to tell if the burning figure was a man or a woman, but in a matter of moments the screaming and gagging sounds died, nullifying that enquiry entirely.

The figures in black had vanished out the back in the confusion, and, ignoring good sense, Mello fought his way up-steam towards them. The gun was tucked in his pants as always, but his brain worked quickly enough to inform him that drawing it now would be a very bad idea. Crowds slowed him down but not enough to completely loose sight of his query: as soon as he was free in the street again he dashed off, hair un-winding and bouncing madly behind him in the run. Cluttered alleys flew past as if he wasn't even moving through them like a normal human. He hurtled two trash cans and leapt a fence as if he'd been doing it most of his life. The figures in black continued their retreat, impossibly ahead and Mello began to lag, his still-injured body failing him. After another two empty blocks he gave up and collapsed against the cool alley wall, breathing raggedly. Through his paranoid, buzzing brain, an idea was forming. An idea that made him want to call and threaten the minister again, if it would mean getting in touch with Near that much quicker. Whoever they were, one of them wanted him dead. There was no way that bomb wasn't aimed at him. Groaning, Mello flipped open his cell phone and dialed a number.

"Sanada-san speaking." A strong male voice replied.

"It's Mello…has anyone showed up asking about me?"

"Not at the house…but Dr. Ikeda mentioned someone visiting the clinic a few days ago…said they were NPA…he had to cooperate. Told them he treated a foreign exchange student for an accidental burn once in the past year."

Mello wanted to hit something. He kicked the closest already-over-turned trashcan.

"I don't think they were NPA…is the picture safe?"

"Yes, what's happened Mello, are you alright?"

"I'm not dead, yet…that's given to change at a moment's notice, you may want to check back in a minute or two." He hung up before Asano could reply, fixing his eyes on the street ahead. He needed to find Near, if he was alive, and warn him. Soon.


	8. Tokyo, Japan

Tokyo, Japan

Two Weeks Later

Matt had almost replied in English when the subway attendant asked for his ticket. He'd been in the country all of six hours with jet lag, no sleep, and not enough room on either the plane or then to reach his gameboy, tucked away in the pocket of his pants. That and he stuck out like a sore thumb in the car, populated mostly by business types gabbing on phones or catching naps in between stops. The prevalent stench was that of dry-cleaning and sweat, creating a humid, starchy air that itched the back of his throat something terrible.

_'Akibara Station. All disembarking for Akibara Station…'_

He shifted the suitcases and tried in vain to better balance the cardboard box on his shoulder, hoping against hope that Lester would be waiting for him the moment he got off. For once, though, something went his way: Lester jogged to meet him outside the turnstile.

"What is all this?" he asked, relieving Matt of the box. "I refuse to believe you accrued this much junk with three weeks as a free man."

Matt grinned at the jibe.

"Actually, it's Near's…he wants to see what I see, know what I know. There's enough fine electronics in there to be the envy of James-fucking-Bond. Miniature cameras, audio devices, you name it, I have to wear it. _All the time._"

Lester shot Matt a sympathetic look, slammed the car trunk shut and ushered him into the passenger's seat. The drive to the apartment that Near rented for him, somewhere in the slums was a busy affair, with Matt wiggling to feed wires through his clothes and set up the audio feed through which he would have continuous contact with Near.

_"Good flight, Matt?"_

"Shut up. Are the cameras at the apartment set up, or am I going to have to do that myself?"

_"Giovanni just finished calibrating the satellite."_

"Look, is there any new word on this cult of yours or not?"

_"There was that club bombing in Paris…and just last night a love hotel that served as a hang out for a yanki gang burnt to the ground. Everyone, including the proprietor had something to do with the gang, all dead."_

"When am I supposed to meet with this yakuza guy? The one you said owed L a favor?"

"_I informed Umekichi you'd be arriving today; I wouldn't be surprised if he makes contact tonight or tomorrow. I have to give you credit…spreading the Kira rumor through the underworld was a stroke of brilliance."_

"I just took a hint from Mello. He was an ace at intimidation tactics. The thought seems to be 'better L than Kira.'"

_"So it would seem. Your priority tomorrow should be looking for a job though, did you get my list of recommendations?"_

"Lester just handed it to me."

_"They're all close by, and wouldn't arouse too much suspicion for someone posing as a student."_

"Saint Grace Court? What the hell is that!"

_ "It's a nun café. Theme restaurants are apparently very popular with Japanese youth these days."_

"I am _not…"_

_'It's a suggestion, not an order."_

"Then why is it bolded and highlighted?"

_"The possibility that the staff there would know something about KS is rather high…62. They only hire young female servers, and it goes to say that a few of them were former fans of Misa Amane, who I believe to be at least partially orchestrating the KS." _

"So, you're telling me that even if I can't work there, I should still be a regular."

_"Yes. There's also The Servant's Quarter, another theme—_

"I can guess. Alright, we're here. I'll make contact as soon as I'm settled in."

Matt cut the feed and helped Lester unload, not at all looking forward to seeing what kind of hovel Near had cleared out for him. The building itself looked like an old lay-hotel, circa post- World War II, temporary apartments to house construction workers during the period of reconstruction. In many areas, the structures had stayed open as cheap housing solutions to mass crowding issues that arose in the cities when the carpenters and architects brought their families to live with them.

The superintendent greeted Matt with a reserved but appreciative bow. She was an older woman, the kind of old who still offered tea to everyone gathered. Not wanting to start off on a bad foot, Matt accepted, leaving it to Lester and Giovanni to move the rest of the equipment up. It turned out to be a good move; the woman was very curious and talked freely about anything Matt asked.

"What is the neighborhood like?"

"Quiet, not much happens on this end of town, especially since last year."

"Kira, you mean?"

The woman nodded. "I don't mean to be grateful, but Kira did more than the precinct could."

"How many other tenants?"

"Seven including myself. I live in the room that directly connects to the kitchen, so if you need anything, please feel free to ask…I worry for young men like you, coming to a strange country alone."

Matt tried very hard not to laugh at the concept of being 'alone' with someone watching and listening to him 24/7. After a few more minutes of casual banter, Lester and Giovanni appeared again at the door to the superintendent's kitchen.

"That's all of it. We have to get back."

"Alright, I can handle the rest."

"Matt," Lester said, "take care of yourself."

'Right, call when you get back."

With that, Matt finished his tea in one gulp, thanked his land-lady and excused himself.

His apartment was at the top of a set of rusting metal and peeling plaster stairs, decayed to the point of making him want to get another tetanus shot _just incase._ The door was flimsily attached to the frame, nothing a good day's worth of repair work wouldn't fix. Settling next to the first of several cardboard boxes, Matt pulled the exacto knife from his pocket and set tediously to work.

"Let'see…personal camera hook-up, back-up cables, external DVD burner, laptop with wireless and Ethernet hook-up, good…back up _camera_…Jesus on a pogo stick, is he OCD or something, why is there three of everything?"

_"Precautions." _A voice said in his ear, _"And, just so you know, it's impossible for you to block the feed on your end. I just thought I'd humor you. I'd suggest getting that camera on."_

"Alright! Gimme a goddamn minute! Even Mello wasn't this impatient, for fuck's sake."

It really was like working with an over-grown child, but, in hindsight, it beat the hell out of prison. Violence in Japan and the U.S was jumping all over the board, and Near's theory concerning 'sleepers' in the prisons was gaining all that much more validity. He hated to admit it, but if they didn't do something soon the popular media would start reprinting the 'Kira Returns!' articles that _Weekly World News_ had been putting out for the better part of a year. They were running out of time.

"All set. How's it look?"

_"As good as the tests. Finishing unpacking and hit the streets for a bit, the better you know the area the easier it'll get if something unexpected happens."_

"You don't like what the land lady said about this being a quiet neighborhood?"

_"Annual statistics make that block out to be a demilitarized zone. If anything it strengths my theory that a faction of the cult is operating regularly there."_

"Probability?"

_"75 take the lack of petty larceny into account…80."_

"Yeesh."

_"Call in at intervals of 10, 15, and 30 minutes. Act as if you're getting calls from friends organizing a drinking party."_

"Aye, aye, captain."

Akibara sweltered in the heat of a vanishing sun, store lights just buzzing on as skinny, fidgeting store clerks beat out trodden welcome mats in anticipation for the evening crowds. He inadvertently startled a few stray cats and dumpster-divers looking for scraps on his way to the more populated streets, the sounds of cell phone conversation drifting down from apartments above like brook water, garbled but melodic. Someone at a karaoke bar was singing a ballad of some kind, probably just another mindless pop song, but the effect was startling to Matt's exhausted mind. Ads in shop windows displaying idol magazines glittered: all gloss, glimmer, falsity.

_"Go in there, I see something with Misa Amane's picture on it."_

Matt silently marveled at the boy's perception skills. He guided him to the display rack and had him browse the article; something about Misa's career as an actress and a mini-review of the movie Spring Eighteen, peppered with tabloid hype and speculation on her disappearance mid last year.

"Finished?" Matt whispered as the store clerk swept past.

_"Buy it and scan the article in later, it might be useful."_

"God I'm glad you're wasting your money on this and not me."

_"You will be 'wasting your money' on far more important purchases, I'm sure."_

"If by important you mean things that go 'bang, bang, bang' damn straight. I still don't see why Lester couldn't have gotten me _something_. A berretta would have served nicely."

_"By Interpol standards you're still a criminal. They would have never agreed to your release _and _armament. It was one or the other."_

The logic was painfully easy to accept, but that didn't make him feel any safer. He browsed for a few more hours, before stopping outside of a plain looking café front with a studded wooden door, like that of a monastery. An intricately carved wooden sign proclaimed "Welcome, wandering lamb, to St. Grace Court."

"I can't believe I'm doing this."

_"It is, as ever a choice, Matt."_

"Bullshit. You just want a free show you voyeur."

_"I assure you this is all in the course of the investigation. Will you have problems talking to the servers?"_

"Do I look like I'm the type to have problems communicating with the opposite sex?"

_"I don't know. That's why I'm asking."_

"No, I'm not."

_"All the better for our purposes."_

"I'm hungry, the menu looks cheap enough; I'm going in."

_"I'll listen and watch carefully."_

_Clong. Clang._

"Welcome, O wandering lamb, to Saint Grace Court. How do you wish to be guided?" Asked a pretty, petite girl with dark, wispy hair dressed in the mini-skirt version of Dominican nun's garb.

"Ah, window seat please."

He was led to a small square table, draped in linen cloth with a single yellow flower in a tiny clear vase in the center. The server put down a wicker cask containing a single place setting, fork, spoon, knife and chopsticks. She watched him expectantly after putting the menu down.

"Is there anything else you would want? Ask and St. Grace Court will provide, as the lord provides for all his hungry lambs."

Matt resisted the urge to roll his eyes at the very last second, so the expression the server got was more along the lines of confusion than anything.

"Have you ever been to a place like this before?" she asked.

"Nope, first time."

"Well, it's common that if there aren't a lot of customers, one of the girls could come and sit with you, would you like that?"

_"Say yes."_

"Yeah, sure, why not?"

The server folded her hands together in a graceful version of an answered prayer and, nodding her head waved for another one of the girls to make their way over. The one who joined them had short, dyed auburn hair and a cute, framed face. She bowed her head and took a seat opposite Matt.

_"Take out the magazine, see if she reacts. And smile, break the ice a little."_

Matt did as he was told, and wasn't disappointed.

"Sugoi! Who's you're favorite idol?"  
"Uh…

"_Hyde of L' ArcenCiel."_

"Yeah, him."

"Excuse me?"

"I mean, Hyde…from L' ArcenCiel."

The girl giggled at what she most likely saw to be nervousness on the part of Matt and took one of his hands and held it above the table. Her hands were the softest, smoothest, warmest thing he'd ever felt.

"I can read palms…not a very sisterly skill I know, but do you mind?"

"Not at all."

She turned his palm over, tracing lines with lacquered nails, an expression of amusement, contemplation, and awe flitting across her face with each pass of her eyes over his hand.

"Short life line…very short. Or, no, wait…it's broken. You know I've never seen that before? It's broken like you've died and come back to life."

Matt grinned as he heard Near chuckle in his ear. "Your love line is weird too…someone was close to you once, but, you weren't exactly in love. It was more like you were blood brothers, although you weren't related. Your connection was so much deeper than that. But you lost him, didn't you? There's no way this was a woman."

"That's right. We grew up together."

"How sad…You have lead a beautiful life, one of untold riches and freedoms, but this will end…that's what that line cutting through there means."

Again Matt smiled, "Story of my life. And, I think I'm ready to order."

She released his hand and pulled out a pad of fresh order slips. He raddled off as much as he could afford, which turned out to be half of the appetizer menu and two dinner entrees, followed by the strongest vodka they had to be chased later, as his discretion, by their strongest coffee. After putting the order in, she returned to his table, looking uncertain.

"Is something wrong?" he asked.

"It's just…your palm…when I said that everything would end, I couldn't say how. But you deserve to know. Fire. Your Mars arch is _huge._"

_Clunk!_

"Oh, shit, sorry." Matt had spilled the glass of water by his left elbow. "Can you excuse me for a minute?" He darted off to the bathroom, checked that he was alone and stepped into one of the stalls.

_"Well that was exciting."_

"She fucking knows, Near. How?"

_"I received no such impression. She seemed genuinely concerned for you."_

"Oh you've got to be kidding! That's a classic act. They old 'let me read your fortune and subversively threaten your life' routine."

_"If it was an act, her body language must be highly disciplined. She didn't exhibit any of the normal signals of lying. She maintained eye contact, didn't shift in the seat or cross her legs, nothing. I do not believe she was lying."_

"Easy for you to say. If I get back and my apartment has been fire bombed, will you believe me then?"

_Not necessarily. You're over-thinking this. Leave that to me, get back out there and enjoy your dinner and company."_

Matt growled deep in his throat, flushed incase anyone was listening at the door, washed his hands and resumed his seat with the now thoroughly embarrassed looking waitress. She flashed him a quick, self conscious smile.

"I'm sorry; you must think I'm morbid, telling people bad fortunes while they're trying to eat." He made a dismissive gesture with one hand, forcing out a little laugh.

"It's quite alright, as I said, it's the story of my life, so how long have you been working here…?"

"Ruki. I was hired when it opened, I live close by, so it's not like I have to walk through the rough parts of town to get here. What about you…?

"Ben. I'm a student who just moved to Tokyo for school from England."

"You don't sound English."

"I'm not. American. Originally."

"Me too, actually. I was born outside of Sacramento."

_"Curiouser and curiouser…"_

The food came and Matt ate as if he'd been starved for the past three and a half days, which was almost the truth—he'd been too unsettled about returning to Japan to eat properly, no matter what kind of gourmet feasts Near held with the other students at the House. If he had truly inherited anything from L and Mello, it was the perchance for culinary extravagance.

"Would you like some?" he offered a small plate of salt-cured eel to Ruki, who took a bite obediently and exclaimed, "It's good!" They shared conversation and food for the next hour or so, Matt enjoying the fact that he could still make someone laugh. By closing time, Matt drained the dregs of his coffee and went so far as to hug Ruki good night. His suspicion hadn't lessened one bit, but he needed to prove that he could act as well as she could when it came down to it.

_"You seemed to enjoy that."_

"She knows more than she let on."

_"I got the same impression. I want you to get to know her better. She could be valuable to the investigation."_

"How much better we talkin' here?"

_"Get close enough so that she'll confide in you. She did say she was unattached."_

"Which I'm not buying. A girl like her would be the type to work in a place like that because her douche bag _otaku_ boyfriend would notice her that way."

_"We don't have the time for you to be noble. He who moves first wins."_

"Yeah, whatever. What about Denuve, has he moved yet?"

_"According to what Hal dug up, he's probably still in France, but he's not safe there. Violence against criminals there is almost as bad as it is in Japan…I can't understand why he hasn't moved yet, if this Denuve is in fact Mihael Keehl."_


	9. Paris Revisited

Paris, France

Revisited

_Huff…Huff…_

_Creeeakkk….SLAM!_

Mello fumbled for the deadbolt on the church door and rammed it home as four successive _thwacks_ jarred against it. Within, flickering candlelight cast a wayang kuilt festival on the walls, shadows of heroes, devils and maidens' dancing madly before calming again, ripples on the surface of a restless dark. Spent, he supported himself against the nearest pew and twined the rosary around his hands in prayer.

"Oh Lord who art in Heaven, lend your protection to a poor sinning lamb." He whispered, inching his way along the isle to the altar, his pale brow slicked with sweat and chest heaving. It felt as if he'd been running forever.

What it boiled down to was that he should have known not to trust a politician. France had looked and acted the most neutral during the Kira years, which is why he had figured it the most convenient to start his search for Near; or rather, L, as he'd be calling himself now. The plan had gone so, so, perfectly at first. He entered the country with a complete false identity, courtesy of someone Sanada-san knew and occasionally bought forged press documentation from—ID, social security card, DMV records, everything. As Denuve he remembered every one of L's cases under that name, including the Minster whom L apparently did a very large favor for some years back. He remembered hearing L tell that particular story one night at the House and recalled the details meticulously. He planned for every possible contingency, every potential back-stab aside from the one that would have gone under _everyone's_ radar: the mad cultist contingency: Mad _Kira_ cultists, who didn't have a problem scouring the earth to find one person and eradicate them from existence.

The club bombing had been a little more than a month ago, but it wasn't until last week that things had really started falling apart. He was shadowed everywhere he went, things and people around him had the tendency to combust sooner or later, and the minister had only just been added to the already extensive death toll.

He'd gotten a call from the minister's office around 2AM that morning, claiming that he'd just confirmed L's last known location through Interpol as Madrid, Spain. He'd aided in the conviction and arrest of a serial child molester. There was more, but either Denuve or his errand boy would have to pick it up in person. Mello should have known it was a trap, but he was so desperate to find Near and make sure he was safe that he buried that particular instinct, got dressed and hailed the first taxi to go by the hostel. The minister's aid was waiting to let him in, which wasn't at all out of the ordinary; that was the arrangement from day one, but the moment he stepped inside, all the warning bells went off at once. First there was the smell, faint but so imprinted on Mello's senses that he'd recognize it in the middle of a rain storm: gas. Next there was the closed windows and lack of air conditioning, no doubt an effort to not let the smell escape into the street, and lastly, there was absence of any security whatsoever.

The aid darted out the front door and slammed it shut, locking it from the outside. The action triggered some kind of system that set the drapes and tapestries aflame, preventing exit by the windows. Mello coughed, backed into the center of the lobby, when someone grabbed his arm. A figure garbed in black held him fast and swung a sickle at his face with their other hand, the blade of which Mello barely dodged. He launched a kick, throwing the cloaked figure square into a burgundy-hued coffee table. The fire was racing all over the room, using every avenue it could and rending air out of the vaulted but rapidly shrinking space. Mello made for the nearest door that wasn't locked, which led into a sprawling meeting room of some kind populated with similarly dressed figures: these wore gas masks and wielded all manner of improvised weaponry, mauls, picks, cleavers were the only ones that Mello's panicking mind bothered to identify. He drew the gun tucked in his pants and got off two good shots before a thick waft of dark, acrid smoke obscured his vision. The rush of fire obliterated all other sound as he struggled to find a way out while the heat nipped and bit at his clothes, memories of the church outside of Nagano, bright against a demon's night filling his mind. It was a one man holocaust.

He forged his way back across the lobby, hand in front of his face and narrowly avoiding catching his hair alight, looking for the cellar entrance. He'd seen the butler use it during one of his previous meetings with the minister. A few of the figures followed, fearless of the flames. Mello guessed their clothes were fire-proof to some extent.

The cellar door was locked, but a shot from the glock remedied that particular problem. He flew down the stairs, knocked into something that made a familiar heavy, clanking sound and grinned. Fire began to inch its way down the stairs as the first of his pursuers mounted them, and Mello grabbed the wine bottle at his feet, smashed the neck open and tossed it. The effect was brilliant as the tiny flames flickering at the figure's feet suddenly grew to engulf the clothing underneath the cloak, which wasn't as fire proof as Mello had guessed. The figure struggled to remove the rapidly combusting garments, lost his footing and toppled down the stairs, hitting the dirt floor with his neck at an altogether unnatural angle. Mello scanned the darkened corners of the cellar, spotted the exit and made a mad dash for it, stopping only to take pot-shots at his remaining pursuers. He shouldered the cellar doors open, stumbling out into a breezy cool summer night, his ears still full of the sound of the flames. It took all of ten seconds for him to regain his bearings, get into the classic shooter's position and take down the last of the figures as they emerged, one bullet ripping through an eye, the other drilling neatly into a forehead.

For a minute, Mello just stood there, a few feet from the crumbling mansion as his assailants toppled soundlessly to the ground, solidifying what he was about to tell himself was a very bad dream; until five more emerged from the shadow of the house, masked faces and gleaming weapons silhouetting ghastly forms against the shockingly bright night: each one a miniature god of death.

Mello ran, mapping out the surrounding blocks and piazzas as he went, skidding on the worn tread of his boots whenever a turn or a chance to elude his hunters presented itself.

_Blam!_

A single running shot went wide, blowing out a street lamp. And all the while, a single thought hounded Mello worse than any other: where were the police? Since the minister's mansion went up he hadn't heard a single siren, let alone caught sight of a single concerned citizen. It was as if the whole city were turning a blind eye. Or maybe his pursuers planned it this way, had populated ten city blocks with their number, the black clad Kira supporters.

It wasn't possible, Mello told himself as he ran. No, it just wasn't possible. There was no way that many people supported Kira. Not here. Here was safe, here was free of fire and death. This was a bad dream. You are going to wake up. Wake up! Mello's lungs began to burn as he rasped for breath, forcing his body to move faster, quieter, smoother. He was falling well into the roll of prey now, using every shadow and shaded alley to his advantage until the church came into view. He made the final dash across the street at a full-on sprint, leapt up the low stone steps and muscled the door open then closed just in time.

His hunters were eager, apparently, but not desperate, because after a while of prowling by the doors and slit stone windows, they gave up. A prayer slipped past his dry lips. Mello pulled himself to the foot of the altar and collapsed, gasping as his pained lungs brought in air and slowly, slowly expelled his exhaustion. He had enough sense to put the glock away, but was ready to pull it again at the nearest hint of continued danger. His vision blurred in and out, and it occurred to Mello just how long it had been since he'd exerted himself this much, and just maybe his body wasn't ready for it. Mosh pits he could handle, escaping deranged cultists was a slightly different usage and expenditure of energy.

Standing up proved more of an endeavor than he would have liked to admit, as every time he tried, a dangerous wave of nausea swept over him; forcing Mello back to his knees.

_Creeaakkk…_

Mello panicked, taking the glock out and aiming it in the direction of the sound, and the sliver of light coming from the front doors of the church. A strangely bright figure walked towards him, but other than that, Mello couldn't discern much more through his tired, blurring eyes. He forced himself to his feet, trying to ignore the mad ringing in his skull, his whole body protesting the action, trying to keep him down. Down was safe, down was rest. But Mello brought his arms up, both needed to keep the gun steady in his trembling hands. The figure was directly in front of him now, and with a simple but firm movement pushed the gun aside. Succumbing to the exhaustion he hadn't known would hit him so hard, Mello slumped again, and the bright figure caught him, held him a moment, then lowered him gently to the carpeted floor.


	10. Paris, Continous

Part 4

Paris, France

Continuous

_"Mello!"_

A distant, yet insistent voice called to Mello from somewhere beyond the dark, painless void his mind and body occupied.

"Mello, get up!" The voice persisted, closer now, clearer. "Mello, _please_."

Didn't they understand that it was hard? That he hurt? That he'd almost died tonight? Took a lot out of a guy.

"Mello, I swear if you open your eyes right now, you'll see something you've always wanted to see."

That did it. Mello pried his eyes open by sheer force of will to see a short, white-clad young man with snowy, out of control hair kneeling besides him and weeping soundlessly. Mello barked a hoarse laugh, then quieted, panic swiftly replacing the joy of seeing his rival weeping at his feet.

"What the hell are you doing here, Near! Do you have death wish? Woah…" Mello had shot up only to be hit with a dizzy spell again. "You aren't safe here," he said, staring up at the shadowed ceiling of the church, feeling Near shift around him. "You have to leave, now. You have no idea how lucky you are to be alive."

Near hefted Mello up, awkwardly for their height difference, slung an arm over his scarred shoulder and began to walk him towards the entrance to the rectory.

"Forget me, idiot. L wasn't a martyr and—

"I'm not L, and it's safe here. Interpol is raiding the suspected cult meeting place as we speak, but if they find you here, we're both dead."

"Aren't you friends with them?" Mello asked, lending an arm as Near made his way through a heavy oaken door.

"Former. Interpol is too divided to trust completely, Kira's influence is wide indeed."

"So once again it's 'L vs. Kira' huh?"

"The seed Light Yagami planted in the collective social conscious has grown into a monster. Without a real Kira, those who followed him have canonized him. They believe that the reason Kira left was because the world was too impure for him alone to cleanse, so in order to bring about the second coming of their god, ordinary people…people with husbands, wives, children, have taken up Kira's cause."

At the end of a shadowed, stone-lined hallway, Near stopped at a closed door and knocked twice in quick succession. The door opened and Near handed Mello over to Lester and Giovanni. They were in a small office with only one window and a set of spiral stairs going down. A laptop hummed away set on the floor: Near strode over and fit a headset on.

"We're ready for pick up, Hal, how do things look on your end?"

_"Ugly. It's a mob scene down here. Neither of the teams MI5 sent in has come out yet."_

"Are they still in contact?"

_"Yeah."_

"How are the cardiovascular monitors?"

_"Everything's normal. Still getting eighteen strong signals."_

"What's you're estimated ETA?"

_"Unknown. Anywhere from an hour to an hour and a half."_

"Do what you can to shorten that. And, bring some of that chocolate and a rubix cube. Spider Solitaire really isn't cutting it."

_"Yes sir. Anything else?"_

"Be careful."

_"Always. Over and out."_

Near took the headset off and stared out the window, giving Mello time to come to terms with the current events. From what Matt was able to dig up in Japan before he disappeared, he was able to put together everything he'd told Mello. There was a cult, it was concentrated in Japan and various points around the world, centering on large metropolitan areas...there was as far as he could tell, no one leader, but a council or collective of sorts. Terrorists, essentially. It was impossible to say if any one of them had a death note, but the chance that there was a death note in Japan was descent. It was unlikely that all of those accidental burning deaths had been true accidents, but the ones that occurred during and after Matt's trail definitely weren't.

Matt had been able to keep up a good cover for a while, but the fact that both he and Ruki Kadoh had vanished together said something for the cult's organization and know how. They'd have to be well funded enough to temporarily jam the monitoring satellite and GPS tracking he had on Matt long enough disable all of it, breaking contact. Near hadn't gotten the slightest impression that Matt had either been followed or was being watched, if he could trust what Umekichi's look-outs had said. And then, a day later, Near got word that the cult would be moving in on Mello. The events were too close not to be organized as a collective effort against the entity of 'L' whom it was safe to assume the Japanese thought was Matt and the French thought was Mello, or rather, Alexandre Denuve. So really, all this meant was that Near owed Mello his life, _again_ the same as he now owed Matt.

"So how did you do it, Near? How did you catch Kira?" asked Mello.

"With some unexpected help," Near replied distractedly.

"Really, whose?"

"You know damn well whose, you just want to hear me say it."

"It would be nice."

"Yours. You helped me catch him."

Mello laughed a little, took out his gun and stared at it.

"It wasn't worth Matt though…"

"He thought the same about you."

"What?"

"He survived, Mello. He was wearing a bullet proof vest the day you two went to kidnap Kioyomi Takada."

"He was wearing _what!"_

"I contacted Matt two months ago when he tried calling your phone from Orange County Penitentiary. Without you, I asked Matt if he wanted to help me track down this cult. He vanished in Japan last month."

There was a loud click and Near had the distinct impression that Mello was, once again, pointing a gun at him. And the chance of talking him down was pretty dismal compared to the last time they ended up in this position. The difference this time was that Near turned to face the barrel.

"I tried to keep him as safe as you did, Mello, but he didn't trust me enough. I couldn't command him the way you did…I'm sorry."

Mello looked utterly incredulous. "Is that all you thought our relationship was? I didn't command Matt, I let him do what he damn well wanted. I gave him what no one else in his life could, Near, freedom of choice. I don't know why he followed me around the way he did."

Near practically scoffed. "Like hell. You two were infamous at the House, Mello, everyone knew but you!"

"What kind of shit was Roger feeding you about me after I left!"

"If you were there, you would have known!"

"What was the point? L was dead, the great mountain we were looking to summit crumbled! I was there as long as I could surpass the _living _legend. Dead, he may as well be immortal!" Mello raged.

"You have no idea what it was like after you left! Everything fell to me! _I_ became the one to surpass. I was L the minute you left. You left me there, Mello," Near accused acidly.

"Nothing was stopping you from coming with me. I sure as hell wouldn't invite you but there wasn't a fucking wall stopping you from following me out those gates, you know!

"I wouldn't have made it a _day out there and you know it!_ That was the wall! You selfish asshole."

Mello put down the gun and dropped Near with a single punch to the gut. Lester and Giovanni moved closer to the two but seemed to understand that this confrontation needed to happen. Near had warned them it would probably go this way. He also told them he was willing to take Mello's abuse…up to a point.

_Swipe! _

_Thwack!_

Near's foot snaked out and caught the back of Mello's knees, effectively unbalancing the blond's already exhausted body. He hit the stone floor, rolled, and settled against the wall.

"So that's what you and L would do all day. _Tutoring_ my ass. He taught you how to fight."

"He also taught me that the mind is paramount to the body, and that to lash out in anger only means you cannot think of a reasonable rebuttal. But then again, we were both pretty immature losers."

To Lester's surprise, Mello laughed, allowed Giovanni to help him up and clapped Near on the shoulder.

"So, what you're saying is that you need my help suppressing this cult and that Matt may or may not be in their dire clutches as we speak?"

"Yes…" Near replied, as nervous as he was confused.

"Sounds fun. When to we blow this dive and get to work?"

Three hours later a thin dawn light seeped over the city, Near removed the headset he'd been wearing since Mello agreed to work with him, at least until Matt's condition was determined, and ran a hand over his perpetually scruffy head. Hal was a no-show going on two hours late and Near was too scared to try to make a break for the airport with their minuscule force. French news reported the riots started last night were escalating in some areas to urban warfare, with Kira supporters showing up in numbers to rival the French task forces sent to quell them.

_BEEP! BEEEEEPPP!_

Mello, Lester and Giovanni shot awake at the sound of a car horn blaring. Near rushed to collect the computer supplies and ordered Giovanni and Lester to act as point and rear guard for himself and Mello when they reached street level. They hustled down the spiral stairs, only moving when Lester had cleared several rooms ahead at a time, and when they finally slipped out into the church courtyard, Hal was waiting for them, looking as if she'd just fought her way through one of the supposed 'safe zones.' At sight of Mello, she let out a joyful cry and waved, ushering the boys and Giovanni in the back.

"We've got twenty minutes to get from here to a plane, courtesy of MI5." Hal informed, taking the driver's seat, barely waiting for Lester to buckle in and tearing down the deserted street. "The riots aren't nearly as bad as they sound. As soon as they got the hard core supports rounded up, the rest broke off. But if they figure out L is moving, it'll rally them again. I still don't know how they figured out we were here."

"What's the plan when we get to the airport?" Lester asked.

"I didn't have one; I figured Near would come up with something."

"I went through several scenarios and took care of arrangements for the most likely one in advance." Near chimed in, "When we get to the airport, there will be tickets waiting for us, ordered under the name Denuve: half of those tickets will be to London, the other half to Edinburgh, Scotland. We'll separate as we see fit. Preferably: Hal and Mello on one, Giovanni, myself and Lester on another. The French Kira supporters believe Denuve to be L, so it'll throw them off if Mello has less security. They won't pay any mind to a young man traveling with a minor escort, it happens all the time."

Mello seemed about to agree to the plan until it occurred to him that it meant separating again.

"Wait, no. We are not getting on separate planes…they'll have agents on all of them."

"I've taken that into account, and there's no getting around it. If it comes to a confrontation, Hal, Giovanni and Lester are authorized to carry weapons—their particular false identities are as plainclothes air marshals."

Mello had to admit that was a damn clever bit of forethought on Near's part, and made a note to let Hal carry his gun because he sure as hell wasn't ditching it in France, not when it had survived two assassination attempts in the past few years: the church in Nagano and just last night. He was beginning to think it was lucky.

Hal was forced to slow as they drove through a task force check-point, but not before making sure Near and Mello were well concealed in the back. It wasn't as if she didn't want to trust the task force, but she didn't. The first battle against Kira had gotten her out of the habit of trusting someone just because they wore a uniform. They were ushered through and Near tentatively poked his head up from under the seat, followed by Mello, who had at some point discovered the stash of chocolate in the side door compartments.

"Eh, someone developed a sweet tooth," in a hitherto unknown gesture, Mello offered a bar to Near, who refused. "Waste not; want not," shrugged Mello, and ripped into it. Past the check point, signs of the rioting were clear, overturned and smoldering cars, broken store front windows, splatters of blood on the sidewalk pavement. The normal people of the world that were driving or walking through it to their jobs looked ashen and sick. Near caught sight of a woman walking with her young child, the child hugging close enough to almost trip her—

eventually she was forced to carry them.

"My god…" Hal breathed, slowing again, as what had appeared to be just detritus in the road turned out to be giant writing, a whole paragraph of it, proclaiming the omnipotence of Kira and in great, red letters: _"Repent, for the end in extremely fucking neigh." _

"It's going to be like this wherever we go, isn't it?" Lester said. "As long as the rumor of L exists, wherever we go…"

"It is unavoidable. The Japanese government's decision to so vehemently denounce Kira after the fact instead of living with the shame spurred Kira's followers to believe he really was gone. But for many of them, for most, Kira was never a man; Kira was an idea, a very persistent, real idea. To many he was their deepest untold desire personified, like Misa Amane and Mikami Teru. And ideas don't go away. Ideas fester, especially bad ones. And if enough people agree with that idea, they find safety in numbers and conformity and challenge accepted social constructs: in this case Justice. Give it time, and the fervor will taper." Near finished his exposition and went back to staring out the window. He could see the airport's massive frame a few blocks down.

Mello grunted, pulled the gun from his pants and passed it to the front.

"Hold onto that for me Hal."

"Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit. Bad." Came the mantra from the driver's seat.

There was another task force check point right by the airport entrance, and neither Mello nor Near had time to duck. Hal brought the car to a halt and Lester swiftly slipped the gun into his coat.

"Morning mama," said one of the soldiers, "I was told this vehicle only had three passengers, when did you pick those two up?" He nodded to Near and Mello, who were both trying to look as impassive as possible. Thankfully it was something they excelled at—or at least Near did. Mello managed more or less an expression of mild confusion.

"Between checkpoints. They were looking for a lift and with all the weirdos still running around we figured we'd oblige." Hal lied flawlessly. "They're a little spooked."

The solider nodded and waved for them to park and get inside. With the air marshal's ID the three former SPK members slipped swiftly through security while Near and Mello had to wait in a moderate line.

"It would be advisable," Near whispered, "for me to get the ticket to London and head straight back to the house and meet you in Edinburgh when you touch down."

It took a moment for Mello to catch that when Near said 'house' he meant 'Whammy House.' He couldn't disagree, but something about the whole situation still didn't sit right.

"Alright, but on one condition."

"Name it."

"Don't go straight home. It's bothered me since you found me in the church that these crazies in black knew that Denuve was another name for L. There's a leak, Near, trust me on this."

"I know. I just don't know who. I'd trust Lester, Giovanni and Hal with my life."

"You're forgetting someone."

Near gave him a puzzled look.

"Roger." Mello clarified.

"Absolutely not. He practically helped found Whammy's. He was the first graduate."

"I'm not saying it is him, but, just wait for me in Edinburgh. Don't go right home."

Near looked as if he was having a very hard time swallowing what Mello was suggesting he consider. It was like being told Santa sold out to the dark side of the force. After getting through the metal detectors and distributing tickets, Near nodded a farewell to Mello and Hal, keeping a pale blue eye on the two of them as long as he could, before boarding and sitting in between Lester and Giovanni.

What little luggage there was, Hal had shipped ahead of them, which made Mello's request of not going straight back to the House a precarious position should anyone working there be the informant he suspected. If the luggage arrived without them, there was a small chance, 5-7, that the informant for the cult would take that as a sign that he/she was suspected. But whether Near agreed with Mello or not, he trusted him completely. They would go straight from London to Edinburgh.


	11. Shibuya, Tokyo Japan

Shibuya, Tokyo Japan

June 10th

The Dolphin Hotel was the single most tragic, unappealing, water stained, five story shack the whole of Tokyo had to offer. It was possibly the only still-standing example of an architectural evolutionary dead end, something from a by-gone day that had hopped on a log, washed up on the wrong shore at the wrong time. Yet it still somehow persisted in living. Beyond all logic and convention, the Dolphin Hotel had stood for close to forty years.

Matt had almost started to like what he'd seen of the place, not much aside from the room he slept in, the bathroom and a room made up like some kind of freaky office/shrine deal. They let him smoke, which he'd finally gotten around to doing again in between the interrogations and occasional beatings. From what he gathered, the cultists figured him for L, his trial being some big elaborate ruse on part of the American, Japanese and British governments. The ones that had kidnapped him and Ruki weren't amateurs either, he guessed yakuza or ex-military the way they scattered about in that kind organized bedlam that only someone else with military training could recognize. They'd sure as hell done a number to his apartment.

A pair of dark eyes appeared in the narrow slot window in the door and Matt picked his head up a little from his cot, messy red bangs flopping in his eyes. The knob unlocked and turned, and two black cloaked figures carrying candles and a pair of manacles flanked the room.

"Father Raku wishes to see you." One of them said, moving in on Matt so quickly he was barely on his feet before the manacles were secured over his raw wrists. Randomly, Matt had decided he liked The Dolphin better than prison—the Dolphin had character. The gothic touch added by the cultists only seemed to add to the sense of dankness and decay that had long since claimed every plank of wood and inch of drywall. Nothing was even either. Tables, chairs, everything wobbled or had been constructed with a faulty level. There were things in the hallways that shouldn't be there, tiny one-person dining tables like the kind at open air cafés, room service carts full of cleaning chemicals abandoned for some reason by the errant or non existent maids.

Matt's escort led him smoothly down a twining, relatively uncluttered hallway that ended in a door unlike any other on the floor. That was another thing that Matt liked. Apparently, no one could decide what style of door to use so every one was different. Every, single one. The one he stopped in front was a heavy, baroque looking monster with a rusted ring for a knocker/knob. It belonged in a castle somewhere out on the Irish moors. The door to the left of him was a simple wooden door painted blue with a brushed steel knob, and the one down from that a pale cream with a handle and latch. It helped to have things to put your mind on rather than wondering if you were seconds, minutes or days from dropping dead.

"Bring him in," a cold, dangerous voice commanded from beyond the monstrous door. The escort did as they were told and took Matt in, careful to close and lock the door behind them. The room they stood in must have once been a suite, for it was the largest out of any of the rooms Matt had seen so far. The front of the room was an office, complete with immaculate dark burnished desk, and comfortable, plush chair. The additions that made this desk belong to the leader of a cult were small, but telling. There was a huge binder and daily planner marked with odd words and times: 'pictures' 7:30, Ginza Rex Ltd. 'names' WR098N072A16T1300. Some of it Matt had been able to figure out. He knew that 'pictures' were the photos of criminals to be punished, which were left disguised as memorial offerings to the disappeared Misa Amane at various points around the city pertinent to the former model and actress's career. Cultists would leave albums full of cut-out articles and pictures about their favorite idol with the photos of criminals taped to the back. Someone would go around at a random time and collect them, and then they would start looking for names if a name wasn't provided. This much Matt and Ruki had figured out together and told Near. This much before the shit hit the fan and they'd both been taken in.

Beyond and to the right of the office space was a large open area where a pretty girl sat at the foot of an empty throne, humming sadly to herself. Misa Amane. She wore the garb of a mourning widow, all black lace, tulle and silk. She was tending a bed of baby roses under grow lamps, her fingers frail and shaking. Her blond hair was still styled every day, although Matt seriously doubted the girl was doing it herself these days. She was dying after all.

"Clever maneuvering in Paris, very clever. I'm surprised you kept our brothers and sisters convinced for so long that the real L was gallivanting in that cesspit as Denuve. But the tables have now turned. As soon as _Denuve's_ plane lands in Edinburgh, it'll be razed to the ground, and I will be one step closer to seeing if you are the real L or not." Father Raku said.

Matt tried not to look as sick as he felt at that statement. Near obviously hadn't followed his last bit of advice: "Do not pursue Alexandre Denuve." Because if the cult got a hold of either Near or Mello, the world was seriously fucked—Never mind personal survival that was secondary, what mattered was not triggering World-War-fucking-three.

Father Raku removed a slim black book from beneath the binder on his desk and took out a pen and began to write. His hand was swift and precise and he showed Matt what he's written when he finished. Eyes flitting over a page, Matt could hear the crackling flutter of wings from the same suicidal phoenix that had birthed L and Kira sweep down to consume their legacies. Father Raku's minions would smolder themselves silently across that sweeping English countryside, a patient holocaust of non-believers and believers alike. And then one morning Roger would wake to find that lunatic dawn burning too close to do anything but bellow feebly at the inferno he helped create. The fire that burned Mello long before Los Angeles and Nagano, kept him nursing coal at the back of his throat and had conditioned Near to react frigidly to reality itself would finally creep down the end of the matchstick—Roger and Whammy House burning in effigy of the very thought of L.

Poetic if Matt could bring himself to appreciate the irony, which he couldn't.

Father Raku grinned at the obvious distaste Matt took in his plans and as soon as he had allowed him to process the information, whipped the death note away, crossed off the last few lines and wrote something else.

"More to your liking?"

"Go to Hell, you cock-sucker."

_Slam!_

A strong hand bashed Matt's skull against the edge of the desk; a blinding pain ripped across his head and blood blinded his eyes. Somehow, he managed to regain his footing again and smirked up at the towering Father Raku.

"I was already there, thank you very much." Raku said smoothly, wiping the smear of blood off the edge of his desk, taking care that Matt saw him put a finger in his blood and lick it off. "And I prefer this. Take him away and bring me the girl."

Matt struggled for the first time, almost enough to break the iron grip of his escort.

"She's shaping up into a devote little follower," Raku sneered, "she might be ready for a little trip to Edinburgh."

"You asshole!" Matt didn't care if he was rising to the bastard's bait--it was his fault Ruki was involved in the first place. He wasn't going to see her made into another mindless drone for Kira.

The escort muscled Matt out of the room and back down the hall. They were reluctant to take the manacles off, but it was by Raku's orders he be unbound while in his room—something to do with that if he really was L, he'd figure a way out by wits alone. But Matt wasn't L, and he was beginning to think Raku realized it too. And if that was the case, he wasn't long for this world and neither was Ruki.

A few minutes after the guards left him, Matt heard the three person march that told him Ruki was being brought to see Father Raku. He stood on his toes to peer out the narrow slit only to see something that made his heart skip enough beats to make him very, very nervous.

Ruki was still wearing her work clothes, the white frill of the skirt yellowed with dirt, the dark blue cowl stained darker by dirt or blood, her once shiny little shoes dull and scuffed. But it was what she was wearing over it all that mattered: a simple black cloak. She still drug her feet like a captive, but her eyes were blank and stared raptly ahead, as if she saw something beyond the molded, rotting, dankness that engulfed all of The Dolphin. It was either the beginning or end of complete nervous breakdown. Matt had seen it before on the first major MI5 operation he'd been on. It was what he saw when he looked in the mirror for two weeks after that operation.

Matt had been in tight spots before, but he had never been alone in said tight spot. He'd had a team of highly trained, professional bad asses or in the case of Mello one untrained but extremely creative bad ass backing him up. Here, in Japan, without Near talking in his ear every minute or so, barely giving him time to think, he was alone…and terribly, horribly afraid.


	12. London, England

London, England

June 10th 10:06 PM

"Go, go, go!" Giovanni pushed Near ahead of him as they dashed through King's Cross, bowling innocent, unsuspecting commuters over in a desperate run to escape the trio of cloaked figures closing in on them. Giovanni turned, cocked his gun and tried to aim, but his panicked, jostling steps made it impossible.

"Save it!" Lester called, waving them on from the rear. One of their pursuers caught the big man by the shoulder and tried to turn him around, but an elbow to the chin freed him long enough to widen the gap. They broke out into the parking lot at a full sprint, Near a white bullet careering madly through the almost empty lot. No one stopped them; the station guards were either in between shifts or had nothing to gain by aiding one side or the other. A side-view mirror right to Near's side exploded in a burst of fragmenting glass as a throwing knife barely missed him. For one maddening glance behind, Near saw the face of the thrower, countenance twisted in an unearthly snarl, one that promised every Chinese Hell if caught. And two seconds before he could turn his eyes away from that unholy stare, one of Giovanni's bullets found home. It obliterated the front teeth, sending fragments of bone and rent flesh everywhere. The front windows of two cars splattered with blood as the face beneath the darkened hood was wiped from the face of the earth; and for a moment Near believed that no one on earth would remember what that man looked like, save for him.

Near slowed enough for Giovanni to get ahead and pull him bodily into the closest and darkest alley, where Near tried to vomit as quietly as humanly possible. In the year and a half since the conclusion of the Kira case, he'd seen a lot of things, but a good deal had been after-the-fact: Near knew what someone who had been shot in the face looked like under the harsh glare of halogen, had picked through entrails as 'evidence' but never once had it been so _real._ Two gunshots rang out in the street and Lester dashed into the alley, heaving and clutching his right shoulder. Blood leaked out from between thick strong fingers.

"Why is this happening?" Lester asked, "Near, you know. Tell us."

It was a distraction tactic. Lester knew that if they didn't get Near somewhere guaranteed safe soon, the boy would suffer a total breakdown. Already the snowy haired boy huddled against the alley wall and shook his head as if in denial of everything around him: he was shutting himself down.

"Near." Giovanni put a lean hand on his shoulder, "Help us out here."

Near looked up. "It is happening because there _is_ a Death Note in Japan. The person in possession of it is charismatic, he might be a community leader, a priest, or social advocate. They are intelligent; so much so they believe themselves able to surpass the original Kira. He had enough resources to slip under our radar and under the noses of the gang we hired to watch Matt. They kidnapped him thinking he was L. Matt, whether intentionally or under torture, revealed L's alias as Alexandre Denuve...unconvinced and confused the Death Note holder had his operatives in France move in on Mello, and now me. There is a 40 probability that there is a spy for the Kira supporters at Whammy House, considering that Matt doesn't strike me as the type to give under pressure. I only mentioned Denuve a few times."

Lester nodded and started to usher the other two down the alley. Almost babbling from stress, Near continued his monologue.

"Ideally, we have to make sure everyone at Whammy House is who they say they are, but that will take too long. Mello suspected Roger, and that's where we'll begin. We have to conduct an independent probe of Whammy House."

"How?" Giovanni asked, motioning for them to stop at the opposite mouth of the alley. A quick sweep and they were moving again, their steps ringing painfully loud against the cobbled backstreet.

"The NPA. As the saying goes...'the enemy of my enemy is my friend.'" Near was starting to sound a little more calm, his voice evening out, but his hands refused to stop shaking. There was a acidy taste in his mouth and the back of his throat ached when he swallowed. "There is a 85 probability that Mello and Hal have experienced similar persual in Edinburgh--we have to communicate to them another meeting place. After which we will meet and determine whether or not Roger Samson is who he claims."

Five seconds later, Lester's cell phone beeped.

"It's Linder." He said, eyeing Near in that way he did whenever something went a little too on the mark. "Hello?"

_"Lester, is your team alright?"_

"For the moment, how about you?"

_"Well, I think we're safe. Mello's convinced doom will come raining down any minute. We...we picked up someone along the way...sorta."_

In the background, rising over the static of their less than perfect connection were a jumble of voices, one eventually winning out, a boy's voice, saying, "just let me talk to Near already!" followed by a harsh, "oh, stop that already, I'll have him on in a minute!"

"Was that Mello?"

_"Yes, and he's going to burst if I don't get Near on the line, could you?"_

Confused, as he normally was, Lester handed the phone up to Near who answered it with a dispassionate, "Hey Mello."

_"There's a sobbing wreck of a girl named Ruki Kadoh who insists on talking to you. Here."_

A frantic, female voice burst over the line, making Near hold the receiver several inches from his ear.

_"Near, this is Near right? Oh thank god...I know where they're keeping Matt but no one will believe me. Your friends...they're convinced I'm being controlled by the Death Note...whatever that is."_

"The probability that is the case is at least 75. They're wise not to trust you, and if that is the case then you're not long for this world anyway."

There was a whimpering pause as Ruki processed Near's emotionless assessment of her fate, when she gained her voice again, it was strained from holding back.

_"If I'm going to die anyway, Matt is at the Dolphin Hotel in Shibuya. I don't care what you think of why I'm telling you that but please help him...He was alive the last time I saw him."_

Near half expected to hear the girl drop dead over the phone, her ruse uncovered, but when nothing happened, he stood in contemplative silence for some time.

"I need to speak to Mello."

The phone was handed over again, just as Lester made a 'can we wrap this up?' gesture, more out of nervousness than urgency. Giovanni's eyes were constantly shifting between the shadows all around them, fatigue obvious in his gaze.

_"I'm making it your call Near, as far as what to do next. If I sit here trying to guess if it's a trap or not, we'll both end up dead."_

"There are plenty of places to hide in London. Meet me here, we'll contact the NPA only when we're together."

_"I figured you'd fall back to that. See you in a few hours."_

The phone went dead. As Lester continued to steer them through a series of dripping, toxic looking alleys guided by a silent GPS, Near couldn't help but be surprised at Mello's clarity in the situation. Keeping the girl alive was a risk, but who's to say that too wasn't part of the new Kira's plans, if he understood that much about the Death Note already? What happened on the flight proved they had command of it enough to enlist the aid of as many supporters as he needed. The group that had pursued them from King's Cross was undoubtedly alerted by the "L is on this flight" revelation.

But try as he might to suppress it, the nagging suspicion that this new Kira was manipulating Mello _along _with Ruki Kadoh would not leave him. Why send her to Scotland when the other L she had contact with was in England? It could be that Near was giving this Kira too much credit, but if they'd spied on Mello as long as they did they'd have known he had no contact with Kadoh. So again, why Scotland, why to Mello?

"Near, let's go...are you alright?"


	13. Chiba, Tokyo

Chiba, Tokyo

June 11th

A frenetic, pulsing light coaxed Tota Matsuda from a restless semi-sleep, causing an uncoordinated arm to lash out, bash it's knuckles on the bedside table before closing over the tiny vibrating phone. Blue digitized characters spelled out 'Aizawa' and the eyes taking those characters in widened as a stone settled in Tota Matsuda's stomach.

_"What-the-hell-is-this?" _he grumbled, swinging his legs over the low bed, banging his knee for the ninety-millionth time. He limped into work these days—one pay raise a year wasn't enough to live comfortably in Tokyo and he'd known that coming out of college...not that it had stopped him from sticking with the same job for the better part of ten years now, but the truth of the matter was that he'd almost resigned/walked off/come-inches-from-being-sacked in the past month that seeking ulterior means of employment was not in the cards. After a while, the phone stopped buzzing in his hand and he sat on the edge of his bed with his pants on and his head in his hands. This was it. This had to be it.

Dawn was still hours away but the city still shot fitful bursts of neon below, persuading the not-quite-as-young-as-he-felt detective from the bed to the wide, sprawling window that over-looked scores of restaurants, hotels, the cram school on the corner and a multitude of other steel and concrete citadels.

_Bzzz...Bzzz...Bzzz..._

"Fuck, I'm coming...god." It wasn't every day that a guy woke up early to tear through morning traffic just to be on time to his own sacking, but seeing as he'd done it at least twelve times already, if Matsuda couldn't be anything else in life, he could at least be consistent.

On the way, he tried not to be angry at Aizawa. They were different men with vastly different priorities and the commander had already come down on Matsuda's side more than was occupationally healthy. They'd both paid their due amount of lip service to the brass to keep the checks coming every month, and sooner or later, one of them was bound to get the boot.

As the smooth stone and steel front of NPA headquarters appeared after a turn, Matsuda was more than a little heartened to see Ide, Mogi and Yamato waiting for him by the bullet-proof sliding doors. None of them were smiling exactly, but he could tell they were glad to be there. They had been through too much together. He pulled into the wrap-around driveway, creaking the car into park; allowing Yamato to open the door for him. The young man looked nervous, still too green to put up the mask that Ide and Mogi had long since mastered. There was something undeniably comforting to Matsuda about the idea that someone was having just as difficult time dealing with things as he was.

"Sempai..." Yamato said, letting the word taper off into worried mumbling. Matsuda shook his head, mustering the stupidest grin he could manage. Stepping out of the car, he slung a playful, companionable arm over Yamato's shoulder and did his best impression of one of those obnoxious American game show host types.

"Don't sweat it, Yamato-kun, for soon _you too will be able to afford that most wondrous of luxuries...a one bed room Tokyo flat! Sell your car, sonny, you're in the big time now! With convenient access to the I, J and Yamanote lines! And," _ he added, "you get my office. That's a hell of the thing to pass up." Together, the four men stepped through the doors into the spacious lobby, illuminated in the early morning gloom by panels of pulsing halogen and beams of sky lights. Before any of them could make their way to the elevator, however, Matsuda rounded on them, looking stern.

"And that goes for all of you," he said, continuing his earlier thought, "I won't have you steeling my thunder by quitting right after the commander fires me. I see those resignation slips in your pockets."

Mumbling, Ide, Yamato and Mogi crumpled the elegant slips of white paper like discarded prayers, and tossed them into the closest trash can.

Before the elevator door opened to the third floor west corridor, two aggravated male voicessounded through the heavy metal doors. Commander Aizawa and the Vice Director of Special Investigations were arguing. Matsuda let out a steadying breath and set off down the burnished steel, navy and tan hallway at a brisk walk—not breaking momentum he strode up to the door from which the voices originated, knocked twice and stepped fluidly inside just before Commander Aizawa was about to say, "Tota Matsuda is the only man in this department with enough balls to acknowledge what's really going on here!' but had barely gotten past--

"Matsuda?" Aizawa greeted his entrance with a sort of enlightened surprise. He knew Matsuda well enough to understand that his professional life had just been saved by the young man's barely announced ingress. He accepted the last-minute save with a smile and motioned for him to sit, the smoldering, predatory eyes of the Vice Director watching him as if he would dart back out at the first sign of trouble.

"The Vice Director and I were just about to have a conversation it would be unfair to exclude you from, Matsuda-san." Aizawa said, sounding not the slightest bit threatening himself. Matsuda nodded, but was far from making the first move in the conversation. It was his job on the line and if there was any way of keeping it, it would be facilitated by not saying anything in his own defense.

"As I was telling the Commander," the Vice Director said after a short, irritated pause, "I understand that former Vice Director Yagami took you under his wing, Matsuda, and at the time, that was the right thing to do. Your insight into the case proved a vital moral staging ground for the whole team. But Yagami Souchirou is dead and his ideals should rest with him. It is the opinion of everyone in this department that you are too personally connected to the current investigation and the best course of action would be permanent reassignment out of this jurisdiction. Seeing as your kouhai is still rather inexperienced, Hideki Ide will replace you as his sempai. Do you understand?"

The balloon of righteous adrenaline that had carried Matsuda through the door and to his seat deflated slowly from his chest, leaving him with a displaced feeling of jittery motion. The energy that would have gone into an explosive tirade of indignant offense was no longer there. He blinked.

"You mean, you're not firing me?"

"That could still be arranged Matsuda-san, but I doubt the NPA could suffer such a loss. I'm grieving as it is that I'm loosing you personally—despite some rather redundant theories you bring up in the briefing room—

"Theories you endorsed!" Matsuda blurted, knowing that some of the resentment wasn't completely misplaced.

"—The truth is you're still too good a detective for this organization to lose completely. I understand that you had a lot of pride invested in this confrontation Matsuda-san, but I know you too well, you don't want to lose this job. You're being transferred outside of the city to a barracks in Ibaraki. Now, the Vice Director arrived very early this morning, let's allow him to get some rest, shall we?" Aizawa shuffled a stack of papers stiffly into the 'In' tray on his desk, moved out and bowed to the Vice Director, who tipped his head lightly in reply. Matsuda rose, did the same, and allowed the Vice Director out before casting a single, weary glance at Aizawa.

"Don't forget to check your phone. There are a few things I thought I should tell you before you came in," Aizawa smiled conspiratorially before picking up the phone on his desk and telling the downstairs secretary that Matsuda's transfer orders were waiting to be picked up. Tota knew that smile, but for the life of him couldn't understand why he was getting it right after being transferred to the-station-in-the-middle-of-nowhere. Remembering to lower his curious eyebrow, Matsuda bowed appreciatively to his superior and long time friend before joining the curious throng outside of the office.

Ide, Mogi, and Yamato waited like a group of grade schoolers when one of their number had been called into the principle's office. No one said a word as Matsuda took two sideways steps towards the wall, leaned against it and sunk, exhausted, to the floor. He let out a a painfully long sigh, the energy he had so expected to carry him through continuing to seep out of him at an alarming rate. He felt dizzy. Trying to have something to excuse his quiet breakdown, he brought his phone out of his pocket and held it up to his ear.

"_You have...two new messages...first message, 7:04 am June 11"_

Aizawa's gruff voice filtered out of the phone, just low enough for only Matsuda to hear.

_"Matsuda, you were right. There is a cult. L confirmed your suspicions almost as soon as I had Ide contact him. L is in Japan, with Mello. He says that for now he and Mello are working together and the he can be trusted. They're staying at a hotel in Harajuku with a witness, who is a former member of the cult. I want you to take a statement from this witness and have Ide send it to me. I'm not happy about keeping this from the Vice Director but we can't not investigate this. We owe The Chief that much. You have more time before your transfer than the Vice Director let on, use as much of it to help L as possible—_beeeep

"_Second message, 7:06 am June 11"_

_" Oh, and don't get Yamato involved. Say you're going to go drinking and talk about the Kira Case, that should get rid of him. Good luck, and thank you. Eriko would never forgive me if I got involved with Kira again."_

Matsuda knew that normal people when they were proven right felt a distinct sense of exaltation and righteousness. He felt nothing. The truth was that he'd only just succeeded in telling himself he was overly paranoid and was going to be comfortable with that. Until he realized he couldn't be, and neither could Aizawa or Ide or any of the other NPA survivors. Ever since that evening at Yellow Box, shadows jumped to greet him on the drive home and there was always someone watching from the darkness and laughing whenever he wrote "accidental death" on a police report. Teru Mikami's wide, manic eyes haunted him, and so did the soft, often tearful eyes of Misa Amane. Tota looked up to see a strong arm reaching down for him, Ide's.

"I need a drink," Matsuda said, attempting to recover his former mood.

"He only did it because the Vice Director couldn't stand to have two living reminders of The Chief on the same team," Ide supplied, keeping a companionable hand on Matsuda's shoulder as they made their way back down the hallway. Matsuda remember the endless coffee runs during the beginning of the Kira case, and the way Souchirou would rub his temples just hard enough so his glasses wouldn't come loose. Despite the relative calm that was starting to settle over his nerves, Matsuda couldn't shake the feeling that he would never see Headquarters again. Or if he did it wouldn't be the same. The feeling stuck with him until they exited the sliding glass doors and greeted the city slightly more alive than it had been a little while before. A light, cool breeze buffeted his open jacket as he strode to the car, allowing Ide to take shot-gun while Moji made a polite excuse to Yamato that this was to be a private gathering only, and that if he needed anything to call the next morning. The young man stuttered out an understanding grunt, too lost in his own ruminations to give it much thought. It wouldn't be the first time he found himself excluded from the doings of the elder detectives.

A line of soft strobe from street lamps guided their way into Harajuku, which was intrinsically alive for the early hour. Music blasted from the open doors of gothic night clubs where girls in nothing but sheer lace camisoles clustered together and twittered to each other like birds. The smell of sweat and sugary perfume carried on the wind; followed the detectives like a dancing gypsy down the street. Now and again, Mogi would readjust his grip on a thick manilla folder he carried with him, as if the weight of it were too awkward for his massive hands. The only time anyone spoke was to give a direction or to pass the blocks in small talk, which only served to make Matsuda more tense—news that Mello would be with L didn't exactly bolster confidence, considering the last anyone actually saw of the blond maniac was before the epic demolition of a rundown hotel in west LA. Matsuda's memories of that night drifted back in echoes, too painful to be examined in close detail. It had taken everything he'd had after The Chief's death to stay on. It dawned on him some time ago that if it weren't for the death note, Mello and The Chief would have never crossed paths in the first place and if anyone was to blame, it was Kira. He'd done a good job in the last year or so in separating Kira and Light Yagami, even if he realized it was a pale rationalization of his own weakness.

"That's it," Ide pointed to the least likely place Matsuda could have ever imagined to meet L. A set of bright, gaudily lit steel rails led up a small flight of of steps to the door of a love hotel. Neon burned his eyes, humming from the bottom windows in every shade of pink and red he could name and from the inside, glossy pictures of rooms had been taped along with their price per hour. Ide led the way in, bearing through the curious look from the receptionist and asked to see the guests in the "Velvet Paradise" room. Trying not to pay attention to the sound of muffled sex assaulting them from every direction, the detectives made their way down a dark, hormone-drenched corridor to a door draped in deep purple velvet. Ide knocked. Matsuda could feel the figures within the room stir through the floor and a second later, the mechanical lock on the door went from red to green.

A young man with messy dark hair greeted them, concealing the gun in his hand just enough to not be seen by the security cameras lining the hallway. He beckoned them in with a nod, slipping aside to give Matsuda his first good look at the room. Deep velvet and velour slip-covers disguised every surface, draping from the floor and walls in dull, glittering pools. L, or rather, Near was perched on a stool, bright against the darkness while the young blond on the bed adjacent succeeded in being the only one who looked as if he belonged there. He was far less clean cut than Matsuda remembered, his hair long and frayed, obscuring a patch of brutally marred flesh over his eye. The skin looked half-melted, the scars whorling down his neck and bare arm. Next to him was a nervous looking Japanese girl who shook constantly and couldn't take her eyes off her shoes. Mello elbowed her.

"Hey, they're here," he said, his japanese as gruff as ever. The girl looked up and nodded. Flanking the bed were Near's only other companions, a tall blond woman and a broad shouldered flaxen haired man. The man kept his gun trained on Ide until Near waved, his hand trembling uncharacteristically. Though he barely moved, he sat loosely on the chair, not in his usual tight posture, and one hand compulsively twirled a lock of snowy hair.

"It is good to see you again, Detective Matsuda," Near said, "There is a lot we have to discuss."

"So, there really is a cult?" Matsuda said as Mogi placed the manilla folder on the bed next to Mello.

"Yes," Near replied, "you were right to contact me when you did. If you had continued to pursue your theory alone, you may have died."

Matsuda shook his head, "I wasn't alone, but...why only contact us now?"

"We have reason to believe someone at Whammy House is under the cult's direct control, and your experience with the first Kira case may be needed. We also have reason to believe the leader of the cult is in possession of a death note," Near stated bluntly. An uncomfortable pause settled over the room as the three detectives considered the implications Near was making, "The young woman with us is Ruki Kadoh. She was kidnapped and partially brainwashed by the cult. For her own safety and our own, I am here to request that the NPA take her into protective custody. I do not believe it was in the cult's plan for her to break from them so quickly, if at all."

Ruki jumped when her name was mentioned an again eyed Matsuda with a blank, nervous gaze. She looked stunned to find herself where she was.

"Go ahead, Miss Kadoh, tell these men what happened to you," Near's deadpan voice was the last thing Matsuda would call encouraging, but after a moment, the words spilled out of the girl's mouth almost too fast for him to follow. Thankfully, Ide set a tape recorder on the edge of the bed in time to catch the most important details.

"I...worked at a theme resturant in Akibara where a lot of the girls were fans of Misa-Misa. They talked about Kira a lot too. When Matt came around and told me he was investigating a cult, all of a sudden they started being really mean to me at work. I never said anything to them about what Matt was doing. He didn't tell me much either, really, justed talked about, _him_ a lot." She motioned to Mello, "Every chance he got, he told me about how during Kira's reign he and Mello fought to take Kira down. About going to school together in England too. Anyway, eventually we learned that the cult used a drop off-pick up system to get the names and faces of criminals. They'd tape the pictures of criminals to the back of idol magazines and leave them all over as tributes to Misa-Misa, then somebody would pick them up and deliver them to Kira. We watched them for a while, but one night when we were getting ready to find out where they took the photos, a whole bunch of men and women in dark cloaks broke into Matt's apartment building and set it on fire...they captured us in the confusion and brought us to The Dolphin Hotel. They didn't want us to see where we were taken but we did." Ruki paused, took a trembling breath, looked desperately at the faces of the men around her and continued. "They...kept us in separate rooms, but I knew Matt was alive because Father Raku, he's the cult leader, talked about him. Father Raku showed me proof of Kira's good work in the world...they showed me pictures of all the people Kira had killed and how all he wanted to do was preserve justice. I...was so scared I just started nodding along with everything he said and for everything I said I agreed with he promised to release me. So...I kept going along with him. It was all I could do to stay alive. They starved me and didn't let me bathe, told me that only those loyal to Kira were allow to live in his world. What was I supposed to do? I told them I would be loyal and live in Kira's world. They let me eat and shower and the next thing I knew Father Raku was handing me a plane ticket to go to Europe. He told me to find Mello, but he called him a different name. He only had an old sketch of him printed out, but I knew him from how Matt described him. About forty of us went to Europe, and when we found Mello I...remembered myself, I guess when I saw him up close. I broke from the others after we were scattered at the airport and followed him on my own. It was luck that he didn't shoot me on sight but Hal stopped him, because she recognized me. I don't know anything about the death note because I never saw it, but...if it really exists and I could die any minute that's fine...I don't want to live after this..."

The only sound that followed was that of Ide clicking off the recorder. The three detectives eyed each other significantly before conferring amongst themselves in a language of indecipherable expressions. When some kind of mutual decision had been reached, Matsuda addressed Ruki comfortingly.

"If you're scared of the cult coming for you again, we'll do everything we can to protect you, but you'll need to answer a few more questions. It doesn't have to be now, this isn't official or anything but before we do anything to help your friend we need to know a little more about the cult."

Ruki nodded, looking relieved for the first time. Mello, in the interim had begun leafing through the thick manilla folder. A gloved hand paged through a volume of hasty printouts before settling on one. He walked it over to Near.

"His real name is Roger Sampson and he's no stranger to the British press. Taught for fifteen years at Chester Boarding School, graduate of Whammy's, never came close to reaching the successorship but came back after retiring from Chester as the proprietor under Quillish Whammy. Distinguished contributing editor of The Independent and The Guardian for the past twenty years, has had any number of articles published in psychology journals...completed his doctorates thesis on the applications of Skinnerian behaviorism to mentally disturbed children in 1983. No one else at the House has anything close to this kind of record. If anyone is feeding the cult info, it's Roger," Mello dropped the stapled report in Near's lap and retreated back to the bed, flopped down and pulled a chocolate bar from under the covers. The crinkle of foil punctuated the stillness of the room, followed by a loud, satisfied 'snap' as a large corner of the bar disappeared wholly down his throat.

"As of now, we must assume that there is a death note in Japan, and that Father Raku is using it to control possibly the entire cult, along with Roger." Near said simply.

"So, what can we do?" Matsuda asked, "other than keep the cult from getting to Ruki?"

"Eventually, a confrontation will be forced," Giovanni broke in, "we won't be able to take on the cult alone, our only hope is the cooperation of as much of the NPA as possible. Just like before..."

Matsuda was assailed with images of some cloaked figure writhing on the ground, bleeding to death the same way Light Yagami had. That chill, mad laugh still haunted him. The smell of blood was fresh in his nose at the memory, sending a resolute vein of cold down his spine. The weakness he remembered facing the first Kira was gone, and only grim duty remained.

"We're it as far as cooperation with the NPA, but we're in. What do you need us to do?" Matsuda asked.

"Mello and I must return to England. We dare not travel alone so Lester, Giovanni and Hal will be coming with us. Keep Ruki Kadoh safe at all costs, and if Kira kills her, contact us immediately. She will be our canary in the mine, so to speak. If Kira kills her, we must rethink out strategy. If not...learn as much about the cult as possible. You will be able to contact us as soon as we touch down in England," in an untold gesture, Near held out his hand to Matsuda, "good luck, detectives."


	14. Winchester Revisited II

Winchester, Revisited 2

There was something strange about the orchard. It was high morning, and in all of Near's memories the fog had never lingered so long over the low stone wall—even that late in the summer. As Lester drove the car past and over the final tiny hill before reaching Whammy's cobbled cul-de-sac drive, an urgent, shattering thought screamed through Near's mind: it wasn't fog, it was smoke. Mello must have come to the same conclusion, because as soon as Near burst from the passenger's seat of the almost-parked car, Mello was after him, opposite halves of a mandala chasing each other over an undulating jade pasture. Near fell twice, tumbling over the dewy ground but his lead was such that Mello was still a good twenty paces behind when Near passed through the dilapidated orchard gate and screamed.

A featureless, blackened human form was bound awkwardly to the skeleton of an apple tree, chin tilted up and mouth agape in what seemed like innocent wonder. With no expression to speak of, Roger very well could have died leaning against the tree and watching the clouds in a laden sky. A torpid, blank expression dominating his features, Near began to shuffle forward on the baggy, wet hem of his pants, either in horror or morbid curiosity. There was a faint, sickening smell in the air.

Two strong arms wrapped around Near from behind—Mello—and together they sunk to the ground. Near pawed feebly at Mello's hands, his mind briefly flitting back to Matt, and in response Mello only held tighter; forced Near to lean back into his chest...process the sight before he went and analyzed it.

"You don't need to see this. Let's go, Linda will take care of it." Mello said, turning Near's head so it was partially buried in his shoulder. After a moment, Near forced his head up from resting on the blond, nodded, and tried to stand. His legs, trembling and non compliant, yielded beneath him. Mello stood, offering Near a hand in support after watching two unsuccessful attempts by the other boy, who bent like a leaf, clutched his stomach as if he'd been kicked, and vomited on the grass.

The blond kept a hand on his shoulder, unable or unwilling to say anything to soften the situation: the cult had used their suspicious research into Roger's background and killed him, the same way Kira had manipulated Shnider to pin him down in Los Angeles last year. The idea of that tactic being used against them again made Mello feel sick, the thought of just how desperately stupid he'd been back then hitting all over.

"We shouldn't stay here," Near said at last, finally taking Mello's arm and hefting himself to his feet. A new, somewhat hard glint reflected in his eyes. The new snow had finally melted and refrozen. "We'll check the house first, then take what we need, money, hard copies of all the house records—there's no way of telling who else Kira is puppeting here, but we knew that going in. No one but us five can know what we're doing from now on...L and Whammy House have nothing to do with each other." Near straightened as much as was comfortable, shuffled over to the corpse and began poking around. Mello watched, trying not to be amazed at the sight, the sudden impersonality of it all.

"Wait back at the car, I work better alone." Near said without looking back over his shoulder, one hand reaching up to mechanically twirl a lock of silvery white hair between his fingers. Swallowing an extremely rude comment, Mello came close to regretting ever feeling sorry for Near and marched back to the car. He was, despite the angry resentment, able to concede that _maybe_ Near had a little more hands on experience in crime scene investigation than he did.

The other three were more than able to put together what happened by the time Mello made it back to the car, dove into the back seat, rummaged for a chocolate bar, and ripped the wrapper violently away with his teeth. Hal giggled, knowing the look Mello wore meant a bit of that rabid inferiority complex was asserting itself again.

"Oh come on, Mello, you should know how Near is better than any of us. You being there would only slow him down--

Mello bristled, opening his mouth to reply so that a few pieces of half-chewed chocolate touched his lips, but Hal continued before he could say anything. "The same way Near tagging along while you worked this case your way would slow _you _down." She put a hand on his shoulder. "I know you won't believe me, but he really can't help being like that."

"Well then neither can I!" Mello shot back, waiting as Near's pale form hiked back up from the orchard, wiping his hands compulsively on his pants. The collar of his shirt and edge of his chin were smeared with light ash and moist dirt.

"I do not believe he was aided in killing himself," Near said, "the set-up is too awkward. He tied himself to the tree by nailing the rope to the back, binding both of his feet and then his arms. Judging from the marks on the ground, the fire started there and spread to the tree. There is gasoline residue on the grass so it's logical to suggest a candle or lighter was used to start the blaze—that would match the love hotel fire early last month. Under normal conditions it takes about two to four minutes for an average adult male to asphyxiate—add in age and that would put the time of death no less than twenty minutes ago."

Lester shook his head, more in exhaustion than sorrow or surprise. He doubted much could really surprise him any more, what with having been hunted from one edge of the world to another by what amounted to a larger, better organized SS or KGB.

"You know what this means," Mello spat. "That Kadoh girl has been part of this from the beginning."

"We were in Japan, Mello," Near replied flatly, "Did you honestly expect them to not know where we were and who we were meeting? They found us the same way they found you in Paris."

"_You _were the one that told us to get onto different flights in Paris, Near. You were the one who told me not to kill Kadoh, and you were the one who brought Kadoh back to Japan."

"If I am not mistaken, you left all of the decisions after Paris up to me." Near clarified, his tone never changing, "You could have killed Kadoh and never bothered to tell me about it."

"_Not _with Hal there I couldn't! You always do this Near, you hold me down...limit me, by being better, by acting before I have the chance."

"I refuse to take responsibility for your inferiority complex Mello, but I have acknowledged your part in helping bring Light Yagami to justice...if that is all you searched me out to hear me say then you are free to leave, but I have a case to solve," and with that, Near brushed passed Mello and made his way up the steps leading to the heavy, braced iron doors of Whammy House.

Mello followed, hesitating on the verge of the foyer, paralyzed by the sense memories of Paris--of the sudden flash-fire heat and shadowed, leering faces. Near hadn't hung back at all, and Mello had to remind himself that it wasn't a death wish only a quasi- complete lack of survival instinct. No wonder Lester and Giovanni stuck to him like wet nurses.

"Mello!" Near's voice called from somewhere on the second floor. In spite of their argument, the motivation that drove Mello to survive the Paris ordeal returned full force. He yanked the glock from the front of his pants and took off for the side staircase. Mello dared to think the force guiding him through the grandiose lobbies and classrooms was muscle memory—or rather reverse muscle memory as he was usually more eager to get out of Whammy House than in.

_Squeaka-Squeaka-Squeaka-Skidddd..._

He almost passed the room Near was in, a narrow but comfortable office in the east wing: Roger's private office. Mello had never been there in his years at Whammy's, as punishment for what had then seemed the litany of infractions that he'd committed was usually meted out in the downstairs office, the one shared by Roger and Linda, the vice headmistress. It was there he and Near had been told of L's death and _from _there from which Mello had fled into his room to Matt's befuddled arms, weeping hysterically. The truth was he didn't remember as much of that day as he let on, he'd blacked out not long after the "L is dead" bit. It had been Matt who had filled in the gaps close to five years later as he nursed Mello back from oblivion.

There was a stiffness in the masked look Near turned towards Mello, a few sheets of printer paper held oddly in three fingers of two tiny hands. Peeking up from the edge of the paper, Mello recognized the marks of the three separate banks that hoarded most of Whammy's finances. His eyes darted to the computer desk, where files were still feeding through the fax machine. It was the only noise in the room.

"Attendance files," Near supplied, following Mello's gaze, "for the whole school."

Mello froze on the spot. Procedure at Whammy's had always been that legal records of all the orphans taken in were kept until graduation, dismissal or removal from the successor program. Near, having taken the name of L six years ago, was considered 'graduated' as was Matt, and Mello, after his supposed death would have gotten away with a polite, honorary 'dismissal.' The fact that Near had to return Mello's picture to him what felt like worlds ago would have meant he was still technically in the running for the successorship then. Maybe it was just some weird clause that was observed more for propriety than anything. The bottom line was that legal records included birth names and photographs. Suddenly, the calm early morning silence of the house turned deathly oppressive as Mello forced himself to think about something else, about how they hadn't walked blindly into a morgue.

"No..." Mello shook his head, knowing that denying the thoughts that dominated his mind was the only way to preserve his sanity. "He didn't...it's not possible..." but he knew what it was like to be surrounded by death, he'd been there once before in a gaudy, lavish, run down hotel in west LA when the few remaining members of Rod Ross's mafia gang had gone down. The silence that followed was one he'd never forget, even amid terrified screams and voices blasting orders over mega-phones: it was as if something had sucked the air out of the room, a kind of silence that was like being deaf. Once he remembered that silence, a blinding panic consumed Mello's mind, and as Near watched curiously, he backed slowly out of the room and dashed down the hallway, the sound of doors being thrown open echoing explosively through the house.

_Bang!... Bang!... Bang!... Bang!... Bang!... Bang!... Bang!..._

Nothing stirred, there was nothing alive in all six floors to protest the mad din as Mello shoved, kicked and busted every door on the second floor open; returning to Roger's office with the glock still drawn, one finger playing with the trigger.

"The important thing is that we're alive," Near started to say; cut off when Mello pointed the gun straight at Near's forehead, his mouth twitching up in a smirk.

"Is it now?" he said breathlessly, "and how much longer is that going to matter?"

"Mello, put it down. This is just like before, Kira will be the only one happy if you shoot me now. It's exactly the same, I expected this."

Mello laughed, the sound wicked and pitiless. All reason fled from his dark eyes.

"This is just like you. Why didn't you tell me you suspected Kira was controlling me? Or...or is you? Huh? There's no way to tell, you know."

"I didn't...I don't have any proof, Mello. And besides, I learned before capturing Light Yagami that if you are being controlled, you can't kill me. It's impossible to control someone with the death note to directly harm another person. So just put it down. This is pointless."

"Whether I shoot you or not, we still won't know if we're being controlled. But I'll feel a lot safer." Mello's finger compressed the trigger half way.

"No, you won't," Near argued calmly, "You looked for me because you knew I was in danger, you came out of hiding in Japan to find me. I called you up here after that argument and you didn't hesitate. You don't want to kill me."

At those words, Mello paused, and some of the madness that pervaded his eyes faded. He stared at Near as if seeing him for the first time. The gun dropped uselessly to the floor and Mello couldn't take his eyes off of it. He finally looked up when Lester, Hal and Giovanni reached the threshold of the office. All seemed as small and helpless as Mello felt, confronted with the reality Kira had imposed upon them.

It was evening by the time enough graves had been dug and all the bodies found and laid out in the inner courtyard, masses of white linen and cotton, all pitifully small and frighteningly uniform. A few of the older students Mello had recognized, even through contorted paraffin masks. The physical act of tossing each stiff form into a narrow pit saved Mello from finding the nearest stone pillar to crack his skull against, and Near's own quiet, contemplative grieving was oddly comforting to watch: tempering, even. Roger was the last, his skeletal frame hidden beneath a shroud of expensive linen, pulled from one of the master dining tables. Distractedly, Mello wondered if L's burial had been so lavishly attended, then guiltily retracted the thought by realizing he would have missed the funeral anyway—he'd left the night Roger told them of their idol's demise. Angry at himself, Mello kicked the final scads of loose dirt over Roger's shroud and cast his eyes back to Near, hunched and inconsolable by the courtyard steps, sheltered from the over-bright evening. He'd been there since the bodies had been hauled out.

Near looked away every time Mello tried to check on him, doubtlessly scared to see the same glazed, mindless expression that had greeted him in Roger's office. It didn't bother him that Near was scared of him, or rather, it shouldn't have. This was Near, after all—his rival, the ghost of a past that Mello had equated with failure and inadequacy for as long as he could remember. Hal appeared suddenly at Near's side, holding a tray of glasses and a filled decanter of water. After a little goading and prying his fingers off his knee, Hal forced a glass into his hand, waiting until he drank a little before offering some to Mello, Lester and Giovanni.

Mello took his glass and sat by Near, looking out over the forty-some neat little holes that from the level of the courtyard steps looked like nothing more than the work of a gopher or industrious mole. The glass trembled in his weary fingers, but he polished it off in two gulps, throwing it into the nearest bush.

"Serves the old bastard right, as far as I'm concerned." He said, feeling Near shift a little further away on the steps.

"I don't have the ability to doubt myself," Near said suddenly, "I cannot question that the actions I've taken until now are my own."

"But I do." Mello countered, "Kira did this to me when he used Shnider to track me down in LA. I never figured out exactly how he did that, even with the death note. It's how I deduced the NPA was working with Kira."

"So how did this Kira know that? He had to. Matt couldn't tell him that, you made contact after New York. Roger was the only informant, and Hal searched Kadoh as soon as you met her, she wasn't wearing a wire."

"You're going in circles, Near, come on. Figure this out." Mello placed two gloved hands on either side of his hips and arched his head back, taking in another placid sunset.

"The only two possible conclusions are that Kira knew beforehand or we were spied on. He had some way of gathering information before Kadoh ever made contact with you, and it couldn't be me, because I wasn't even aware of Kira making use of Shnider before now. The other possibility is that we were spied on, as I suggested earlier. Japan is the proverbial Lion's Den, the chance of Kira not knowing were meeting the NPA is only about 3 percent. That doesn't explain how he was able to use the same tactic Light Yagami used against you then, now. Therefore, the only possible explanation that satisfies those specific criteria is that Kira knew all of this already. All he needed was Roger's true identity to put the plan into action, which he either gained from the NPA's probe or somewhere else."

Mello grinned at the bemused expressions Lester, Hal and Giovanni were giving the two of them. As if the sight of Mello egging Near to a conclusion was really that much of a juxtaposition? The idea that either of them was being controlled _had_ to be discarded if they wanted to get anywhere. Being controlled meant that Kira had both a name and a photograph of the two of them, and while that was more likely in Mello's case than Near's, Mello was going to very wisely omit that thought. Near didn't need to know about the photo, and he wouldn't.

"Well, I'm going to finish up out here," Mello said, standing and stretching as if the matter were nothing more than a gardener planting the last bulbs before the first frost. "See if you can come up with anything else about how Kira knew about our first battle with Light Yagami, there has to be something we're missing."

Near seemed more than willing to retreat into the relative coolness of the house, the sound of shoveling gravel masking his hurried steps. His feet carried him mechanically towards the playroom, still scattered with puzzle pieces and the detritus of a million model kits, discarded plastic frames, boxes and glue catching the darkening hue of the sunset and turning it vaguely sinister. Like after Mello killed most of the SPK members last year. Pausing in front of the mess of toy bits he'd been working through the last time he'd seen Matt, Near knelt and began to pick through, cleaning in a feeble attempt to return his life to a semblance of order. Faintly, through the crack of an open window, Near could just make out the rough movement of soil against the patient symphony of a summer evening.

Mello found Near crouched tensely in the playroom, boxes of puzzles and models stacked like a protective wall around him. He slid down against the wall closest to him, one knee drawn up and the other leg splayed, pointing towards the door: a mutually apathetic silence stretched between them until Mello finally broke it with the question Near had been expecting all day.

"When did you start to suspect I was being controlled by Kira?"

"In London, when you made contact with Kadoh. It didn't add up that she would go looking for you when the person she knew as L was over 200 miles away. I could only conclude that either Kira's plan didn't go as expected, as Kadoh herself claims, or Kira wanted you and Kadoh to meet in order to prove somehow that you were L. When could control of you have begun, if at all?"

"No where," Mello lied, "look, if we sit here debating if one of us is being manipulated, we may as well give up catching Kira at all. The only way we can continue this investigation and not second guess our every step is by assuming neither of us are being controlled."

"I know that, but to disregard the possibility entirely..."

"You said you didn't have any proof," Mello reminded him, "and I just confirmed that."

"If I were Kira controlling you, he could just as easily tell you to lie to me."

"There. Is. No. Photograph. Of. Me. Look, I'm offering you a solution Near, why can't you accept it?"

"Because it is flawed. L would never accept the solution you're offering me."

Mello's one knee dropped in amazed frustration.

"What happened to _'I'm not L'_? Did you say that just to get on my good side or what?"

"I am L. You left and without Matt I was given the name."

There was a heavy sounding _'thwack'_ as Mello bashed the back of his head against the wall.

"What can I do to prove that I'm not being controlled?" Mello said after a short pause.

"Tell me the truth. Detectives Ide and Matsuda visited a clinic in Yamanashi after your phone was found and the doctor there told them he treated a foreigner for burn injuries. They did some checking in town and came up with the name Asano Sanada. A photographer, Mello, the truth now please."

Mello ran a hand over his face, finger tips lingering over the mass of discolored flesh that Dr. Ikeda had worked with right before he left town. The roughness of the original scar was almost gone, a partial erasure of his reckless sin.

"I just, didn't want to be forgotten. Can you even understand that?" Mello admitted, bringing his one leg up again and resting his arm across it to stare at the crucifix hanging from his wrist.

"No, I can't. We were raised to be forgotten, going so far as to forget our true names...all to uphold the ideals of enlightened society: justice, right, you know all this Mello."

"You weren't there!" Mello blurted, "You didn't...feel the fire eating away at your skin, smell the leather when it melted onto you...or that woman, screaming...you've never been that scared. Even when you faced Light Yagami you had both Death Notes. You never had to be afraid of a goddamn thing."

Near waited to make sure Mello was finished speaking before formulating his careful reply. Ever since London he'd been running conjectures through his head as to how this particular conversation would play out, but it hadn't really occurred to him what would result from it.

"I didn't have to be afraid, yes, but I was. I didn't know what to make of you kidnapping Kiyomi Takada at first, but it was possible that you were trying to show me I had the wrong notebook. That was the only thing I could come up with...so I had Giovanni switch them out again. It was a lucky guess that I was right."

"Really?"

"Yes, Mello. I was too afraid to act by myself—I never left headquarters if I could help it. It was the only way I could ensure my own survival."

Mello let out a low whistle and shook his head lightly from side to side in tired amazement—he'd admit he was barking up the wrong tree later, though, when there were less important matters at hand.

"So, I guess the only thing we can do is figure out some way to prove neither of us are being manipulated. Any ideas?"

"I have one," an even female voice said from the doorway. Mello and Near stared at Linder for a moment, wondering consecutively how long she'd been there, but nodded together willing to hear her out. "Go to Japan and get the death note. If you can, that means you aren't being controlled. It's the only way, isn't it Near?"

Mello had to admit it was a damn simple solution; she offered it as simply as she'd offered to help him infiltrate Kiyomi Takada's security entourage. Then again, he'd learned quite a while ago that that was who Hal Linder was: cool, cold, efficient. Never mind the thought alone was as close to suicide he or Near had come yet.

"Just give us the word, Near," he heard Lester say, appearing behind Hal with Giovanni: their hands were covered in dirt, a chill looking sweat streaking down their temples. Their eyes were set on the two young men sitting in the room, effectively waiting for them to order them to walk off a cliff. Mello wondered if that was how Matt had felt, the night he told him, babbling at break-neck speed, about his plan to kidnap Kioyomi Takada.

"Let me get a few things from L's safe," Near said after a while. He stood, stepping carefully over a neat stack of boxes, "Hal, you'll need to book five tickets to Japan. Giovanni, contact commander Aizawa and inform him of the situation, we'll need to meet with him, Mello--

"Give me an order and I swear to god..." Mello hissed, raising a gloved hand in warning.

"I was just wondering if you'd like to have dinner. And if we are going to the Dolphin Hotel I'll need to make use of any mafia contacts Rod Ross may have had. We'll need someone familiar with the area."

To Near's knowledge, Rod Ross had no reliable contacts in Japan, but he needed to get to L's safe without Mello peering over his shoulder. As the blond trotted out of the room dialing swiftly on his phone, Near stepped behind a massive cedar desk in the corner of the room and ducked carefully under it. Lester followed him, standing patiently in front of the desk, peering curiously as Near's wild mass of snowy hair rotated side to side while he worked the combination.

"What are you looking for?" Lester asked.

"How much do you know about Whammy House before you came to work for me?" It wasn't common for Near to answer a question with a question, so Lester paused before replying.

"I know what Roger told me."

An expression flicked across Near's infamously impassive visage that told of distrustful annoyance—the same expression that appeared every time he had spoken to Light Yagami.

"Then I do not expect you understand fully how compromised we are if these records have been disturbed."

Lester started.

"Your school mates are dead! How much more compromised can this institution become?"

"You misunderstand me. It is no longer the institution that matters. I told Mello when we discovered Roger's body that L and Whammy House have nothing to do with each other." There was a soft creak as the safe door swung open, followed by the sound of old paper rustling. "I'll need to take these into the lab after dinner for testing, see that they are concealed until then." Near's hand poked into the air holding a laden manila folder with block, courier type reading "L.A. BB Serial Murder Case" on a creased tab.

"What's so important about these files, Near?"

"When the full scope of Qullish Whammy's control of my life was revealed to me, I then became privy to all of the previous L's secrets. It was that very reason, the morning after, I tried to extricate myself from the position. But Quillish Whammy owned me, quite legally, and my personal feelings were of no regard at that point in time. Of the previous L's secrets, the most heinous concerned one of his own number, a fellow student who could not accept his roll as a 'back-up' L."

Lester nodded.

"This student...B...left Whammy House several months after the suicide of his only peer at the time, A. B was said to have acted oddly at the funeral, do you know how?"

"How?"

"He laughed. As the body was lowered into the orchard grounds, B started to giggle until he laughed uncontrollably. When Quillish Whammy brought him aside afterward to explain himself, B told him that he'd always known A was going to die. In fact, B had been so confident in the knowledge that he'd known to turn down A's bedsheets that night instead of waiting for morning."

"B then explained that the reason he knew A was going to die was because he could see his life span—the numbers hovering above his head right below his given name. B was possessed of natural shinigami eyes."

Ice spread from the right side of Lester's chest, a wave of cold dread sweeping over his body so swiftly he found himself rooted to the floor.

"If Kira for any reason believed going through L's personal files would be of value, he would know by now that natural shinigami eyes exist." Near said, driving the point home in a way that did nothing whatsoever to calm Lester out of his petrified state. The man blinked for what felt like for the first time in ages and asked, "How would Kira go about seeking people like B out?"

"There are any number of methods, and we cannot afford to exclude the concept of an endowed party stepping forward of their own will. One can assume that someone of B's abilities would have lead a telling life."

Near poked his head above the ledge of the desk, dusted off his pants and made for one of the box parapets, opened it and extracted a number of multi-colored rubber ducks and a controller. He fished around a little more and came out with a mesh net in which he deposited the ducks, then slung the filled net over a thin shoulder.

"I'll be in the main bathroom. Call Linda, if she's still alive kindly inform her of the situation and ask if she would be up to making dinner one final time. Have her bring all of the ingredients from her home, I doubt we could trust most of the food here. Better yet, take her shopping, buy it all fresh." Near got to the door and stopped. "Are you absolutely sure about following me on this, Lester?"

"Yes, Near."

"I see. Thank you." The young man replied after a time, slouching down the hall past Mello, who was from the sound of it was fast-talking them into cheap lodgings. From what Japanese Lester understood, his tactic of peppering the conversation with more than idle threats was starting to pay off.


	15. Shibuya Revisited

Matt was being led down a hallway that reminded him of something straight out of _Alice and Wonderland_ any minute expecting to see a tuxedoed white rabbit skittering by proclaiming his tardiness. It just seemed right when every other door was checkered, stripped, warped, rusted, dripping, rotting. A single unbroken chain of light bulbs hung swaying from the residual movement that tremored the walls up to the ceiling.

It was as if all of a sudden someone gave the universal 'scramble' order and he had an idea why. For the last week, the horde of doctors that swarmed Misa Amane had been keeping their distance the same way animals avoid their own ailing kin. Another kind of death pervaded The Dolphin now.

"Wait here." one of his escort said uselessly, holding Matt's upper arm so firmly he could feel that familiar tingle of bruising veins. They led him inside a black and red tinted room, the ceiling draped in sheer black material, a goth mosquito net. A wide, plush canopy bed took up most of the room, the sheets black with purple stars dotting them—posters of idols and framed articles and photos of a pretty young woman with blond hair and two tiny pig-tails filled up most of the wall space.

"Leave him alone with me, please." a strained voice from the bed commanded. Matt's escorts gave each other a doubtful look but complied, locking the door behind them. It smelled like sugar and alcohol, a collection of open perfume bottles enforcing their presence from a shadowed shelf somewhere out of Matt's line of sight.

"Come here." Misa Amane ordered. The closer Matt got to the bed, the more obvious it became just how bad off she was—what should have been the healthy silhouette of a thriving twenty- six year old under the dark coverlet was barely disernable, as if everything below her torso had withered. "What's you're name?"

"Matt," he said, still keeping a respectable distance from the bed, "I thought you knew."

"No one tells me anything," Misa grumbled, "but I do know...I know you took care of that Takada woman. You helped Mello."

Matt wondered if 'helped' was really the right word for it, now that the cards were down. Ever since waking up in the hospital and learning of Mello's 'death' he'd had a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach that wouldn't go away. In the hospital he'd chalked it all up to the adrenaline high of a near-death experience or straight denial and a shit load of repressed survivor's guilt. After all, he'd spent the better part of his year in jail dialing the cell phone number of a dead man and gotten an answer.

"Just one more bug up your ass you and your cult have about me?"

Misa let out a giggle that, although painful, still managed to sound somewhat innocent.

"That won't get you in trouble with me. I hated that witch. Tell me...did she suffer when she died?"

"Did she what?"

"Suffer!" Misa cried, shifting her diminished form under the covers like a much older woman and continuing calmly, "I want to know how she died. Every detail."

Matt shook his head slowly, impassionate.

"I wouldn't know," he replied, pulling a partially crushed cigarette out of his jean pocket just for the comfort of having one in his mouth, "Takada's watchdogs wasted me before I could meet up with Mello."

"You have an imagination, right? Make something up. Lie. Here." Misa groped for a lighter next an incense burner by the bed and tossed it at Matt. He nodded his thanks, lit up, taking a long drag and regarding Misa through bored, mildly disbelieving eyes.

"Lie?"

"It's not like it matters. I'm dying, and I bet you lied to Mello all the time."

Matt didn't feel like denying her that truth.

"Near the end, yeah."

"And you can't extend me the same courtesy?"

"Not that I can't. I just don't like playing into people's sick fantasies. I'm not the world's fucking heel, you know." It was a thought that had dominated Matt's existence for as long as he could remember. First Mello, then Near and now Misa Amane wanted him to bend to her every whim. Fuck it.

Amane coughed violently and pulled a dark red cloth to her mouth, dabbing at a dribble of clear and crimson fluid. Her body shook more than it should have, little waves of motion shivering over the sheets.

"I'll tell you something first then, not a lie, something important. You'll tell me then?"

"Maybe."

She seemed to draw in on herself, forcing her lips through the exposition:

"Father Raku doesn't have the shinigami's eyes," she said, " he killed it before it could make the offer." Matt almost felt bad thinking that he'd figured that out for himself, when he and Ruki learned that the cult collected both names and photographs. The first relatively concrete assumption Near had been able to make about this cult was that there was either no shinigami involvement at all or strictly limited involvement. Nonetheless, the news that he'd managed to kill the shinigami was new.

"How did he kill it?"

Misa shook her head, "...Only so many ways. Rem and Ryuk were pretty guarded about them, but, if a shinigami uses their Death Note to lengthen the life of a human on purpose, they will die. Tell me about Takada."

Matt sighed, taking the cigarette from his mouth and flicking the ashes to the dark, water-stained floor. "Sorry, I'm finding what you have to say a lot more interesting."

"Well fuck you then!" Misa screeched, making herself cough up a bloody wad of phlegm. She moaned pitifully and clutched at the cloth in her hands, obstinately refusing to wipe the blood away this time. An old, rather buried urge resurfaced in Matt as he remembered Mello's agonizing recovery from the building collapse in Los Angeles, which had been more like dying and being reborn. He put the cigarette out on the wall and strode over to the bed, dabbing lightly at Misa's chin with the cloth he took from her hand. She was weeping.

"I don't care if you lie, it's all anyone's ever done anyway. Even Light...it was his job to beat Near dammit! He was so confident...everyone was so fucking confident Kira would win."

Matt felt a pang of rather unintentional mutual pity. Mello had been confident too, even if it was all sugar-coated optimism. He remembered the last thing Mello said to him before Takada's guards penned him in: _'Once this is over, let's go find some dive in Nagano and get shit-faced.' _Click, and the line was dead.

_"_Isn't it enough to know that Takada's dead? I mean, you both used the death note, so it's not like you can point fingers in the after-life if that's what you're after." Matt said, enjoying the manic smile and painful giggle that seeped past Misa's lips. It was such a 'Mello' thing to say.

"You're...trying to stop Father Raku right?" Misa said, the flickering synapses in her brain too taxed to keep up with Matt's wit.

"Yeah, that's the idea."

"Good. He...isn't a good Kira. He told me I could see Light-sama again, but he lied, and he doesn't deserve to go where Light is..."

Matt nodded, not quite following but understanding that whatever Misa was about to say next was going to be big and worth committing to memory.

"Once I die, Father Raku is going to call out all the Kira supporters and challenge the government. My funeral will be the rally cry. I don't want that. Too many of the people Kira wanted to save will be killed...Kira never wanted that, he punished Demegawa for it."

Well, shit. Matt was far from being surprised, but hearing his suspicions voiced and confirmed was more than a little creepy—he'd heard his guards talking about the riots in Paris, the aftermath of which shut the city down for weeks afterward. He tried imagining that on a national scale, even a small nation like Japan and the thought was just too big for him, too big for Near, for Mello, for the memory of L...and it was beginning to happen right in front of him. Inches in front of him.

"I'm still not telling you anything about Takada." Matt said, the bitter, vindictive, self-righteous parts of him hoping those would be the last words Misa Amane ever heard. He was almost right, watching as Amane's eyes peered past any perceivable light or dark, a look that Matt wished he didn't recognize. She smiled.

"Final--

She barely finished the word, her lips still parted, eyes fixed intently on the ceiling. Matt was consumed for about five seconds with the urge to attempt resuscitation, knowing what the withered form on the bed meant, knowing that it symbolized in every possible way the beginning of the end. Once the urge passed, he reached out, passing a hand over Amane's eyes to close them. The touch of her flesh was strange, a mix of warm and cool, more like a firming plaster cast than flesh.

"Finally," Matt finished for her, resuming his lean against the wall as his guards returned. No matter what Amane's death meant for the cult, to Matt, it was only a matter of time before Mello would come for him. If he couldn't bring himself to believe that, then lying to Amane shouldn't have been an issue.


End file.
